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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



ChapF.l-^± Copyright iNo.. 

8iioif..;.i:t63 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



A BRIEF HISTORY 



OF THE 



CITY OF NEW YORK 



BY 

CHARLES B. TODD 

Member of the New York Historical Society, 

Author of The Story of the City of New York" 

" The Story of Washington, the National Capital," etc. 




NEW YORK •:• CINCINNATI .:• CHICAGO 

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 







46741 



Copyright, 1899, by 
Charles B. Todd. 



HIST. OF N. Y. 

w. r. I 



TWO COPIES RECEIVED. 



SCCONO COPY* 




iolt^-SVo 



<^ 



O^ 



^^^^=5^ . 






PREFACE. 



This volume was written at the suggestion of public 
school teachers and members of the City History Club, 
as a text-book for use in the public and private schools 
of New York, as well as for all others interested in the 
study of the city's striking and romantic history. It 
has been the author's aim to present this history con- 
cisely, accurately, impartially, and at the same time to 
weave into the narrative such romantic and picturesque 
incidents, such details of manners, customs, and domestic 
life, as would lend it local color and render the picture 
clear and complete. The causes which led to the found- 
ing of the city, and the men and the agencies responsi- 
ble for its wonderful growth, have not been forgotten. 

In a work so condensed it was impossible to notice 
all the events in the city's history. For these the 
reader is referred to the larger and more elaborate his- 
tories of the city by Mary L. Booth, David T Valen- 
tine, Martha J. Lamb, William L. Stone, Benson J. Los- 
sing, the " Memorial History of New York," edited by 
General James Grant Wilson, and the author's larger 
work, "The Story of the City of New York." For 
material the author has drawn on the large store gath- 
ered for his " Story of the City of New York," first pub- 

3 



lished in 1888, together with important data collected 
since that work was issued. His principal sources have 
been " The Documentary History of the State of New 
York," the publications of the New York Historical 
Society, the ** Manual of the Corporation," the news- 
paper files, diaries, scrapbooks, broadsides, and pam- 
phlets contained in the libraries of the New York 
Historical Society, the New York Public Library, and 
the library of Columbia College, to all of which he has 
had free access. Where conflicting accounts of the 
same event were given, he has chosen that which 
seemed the more probable. Above all things he has 
endeavored to write impartially and without bias. 

As before stated, the book is intended primarily for 
the young. Events with us move rapidly. In twenty 
years, if present conditions continue. New York will 
surpass London, and the school children of to-day will 
then hold in their hands the destinies of the greatest city 
in the world. If they become familiar with the history 
of their city in youth, they will love it, will take an in- 
terest in its affairs, and will be far more likely to guide 
its destinies aright. 

But although it is intended for the young, the author 
hopes that his little book will appeal to the great mass 
of citizens who have but little time for reading, and to 
whom the larger histories are sealed books. 

C. B. T. 

New York, September i, 1899. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

I. Introductory 7 

II. The Dutch Dynasty — Peter Minuit . . 14 

III. WouTER Van Twiller 23 

IV. WlLHELM KlEFT 29 

V. Petrus Stuyvesant 35 

VI. Dutch Manners and Customs . . .52 

VII. The English Colonial Period . . .75 

VIII. The English Colonial Period {^Continued) — 

Leisler's Revolt 83 

IX. The Approach of the Revolution. . . 99 

X. The People under British Rule . . 109 

XL Throwing off the British Yoke . . .136 

XII. The Battle of Long Island . . . .151 

XIII. The Battle of Harlem Heights . . .174 

XIV. New York: in the Grasp of the Invader . 186 
XV, New York the Capital City . . . .195 

XVI. The Growth of Parties 203 

XVI I. Her Rise to Commercial Power . . .214 

XVIII. The Erie Canal 220 

5 



¥AGt 

xVx. The Railroad . . . . ^ . . 228 

XX. Typical Nkw York Merchants . . . 230 

XXI. Ships and Sailors 240 

XXII. New York in the Civil War . . . 250 

XXIII. An Old Man's Recollections of New York 259 

XXIV. A Hundrkd Years of Progress . . . 272 
XXV. Greater New York 278 

XXVI. Brooklyn 287 

XXVII. The Bronx 290 

Index . . . . . . . .295 



1. INTRODUCTORY. 

ALL things must have a beginning, and our city of 
^ New York, now so rich and great, began in a very 
small way indeed. If we had been at the Battery on the 
eighteenth day of March, away back in 1524, we should 
probably have seen there a group of savages clad in skins, 
with bows in their hands, and a quiver full of arrows slung 
over their shoulders, intently watching a white speck 
that became larger every moment. Very soon it grew 
into a birdlike thing that swept on as gracefully as a 
swan. It was the first white man's sail the Indians 
had ever seen — that of the DolpJiin, belonging to 
his Majesty Francis I., King of France, and sailed by 
a brave sailor and discoverer, Jean Verrazano of 
Florence. 

The discovery of America by Columbus, thirty-two 
years before, had aroused the cupidity as well as the 
curiosity of the seafaring nations of Europe, — the Eng- 
lish, Spanish, Dutch, French, and Portuguese, — and 
they were now sending out ships and sailors to discover, 
explore, and take possession of the new land. They 
thought, in their ignorance, that this land was a part of 
India, and that all the treasures of India were hidden in 
its savage and unknown interior. 

Verrazano was one of these discoverers who had been 

7 



8 

sent out by the Kini( of France. If he followed the 
usual course of such adventurers on discoverincf a new 
country, he landed in state, with standard and cross, 
father confessor and men at arms, and planting the 




Manhattan Island in the Sixteenth Century. 

cross and the roval arms of France, he stood beside the 
cross with head bared, and repeated a formula by which 
he took possession of the entire country in the name of his 
royal master. He then sailed away, making no attempt 
to settle the new land. Nor was any ever made by 
Francis, who soon became engaged in war with the Em- 
peror Charles V., King of Spain — a war which ended in 
the utter defeat of Francis at Pavia, and in his being 
carried a prisoner to Spain. Any title he might have 
had to our shores by virtue of his first discovery lapsed 
because of his failure to settle them. 

Nearly a hundred years passed before another vesse] 



sailed into our bay — at least, so far as we have any 
record. But at last, on a mellow autumn day in Sep- 
tember, 1609, a clumsy, odd-looking craft entered the 
Narrows and anchored in the mouth of the river. She 
had a stern much higher than her bows, a high, carved 
prow, and carried square sails on 
the two masts of a schooner 
she flew a pe- 
culiar flag, new 
to the nations, of 
three horizontal 
stripes, orange, 
white, and blue- 







m 



iljiiftim 

' MlllmMtl 
-the 






Dutch flag. The 

name Half Moon ^j, 

was painted on T'^^^^-^^J^^^ 

her stern. ?-^?^^^Sj? 

Before de- """ 

scribing her mission it is necessary to say a word or 
two of the people who had sent her out. The Dutch 
were descended from those rude tribes, the Belgse, 
Batavi, and Frisians, of whom Caesar speaks. Later the 
conquering Franks and Saxons introduced a more refined 
and intellectual stock, which had grown to wealth and 
power under the successive rule of the wise Charle- 
magne, the lords and bishops of the feudal ages, and the 
strong kings of the house of Burgundy. Next these 
states came under the rule of Charles V., and of his son 
and successor, Philip II., the latter of whom governed 
them so harshly that seven provinces, a few years be- 
fore our story opens^ revolted and formed a republic. 



lO 

Philip sought to subdue tliem, and a long and bitter war 
followed, which had been closed six months before the 
Half Moon sailed, by a truce of twelve years signed by 
both parties. You can read all about it in Mr. Motley's 
interesting work, " The Rise of the Dutch Republic." 

The Dutch gov^ernment was republican in form, but 
far more complex than is our own system. The genius 
of the country was almost wholly commercial, but it 
was a nation of great merchants, not shopkeepers ; its 
trade extended over the known earth ; it had on the 
seas at this time three thousand ships and one hundred 
thousand sailors, and enjoyed a trade of sixteen millions 
of pounds per annum — far more than England's, which 
was but six millions. Its East India Company, founded 
to secure the trade of India and the East, was the rich- 
est and greatest trading company then on the globe. 
It had a rival in the English East India Company, which 
had been chartered nine years before, and which, though 
not then so strong, was destined in a few years to sup- 
plant it. Both companies were very anxious to find a 
short passage to India. Such a passage was believed to 
extend around the northern shores of Europe and Asia. 
The Dutch company had fitted out the Half Mooji to 
discover it, but had, strangely enough, given her in 
charge of an Englishman, a famous navigator of those 
times, named Henry Hudson. 

Hudson, as you will find, was not here for settlement, 
but as a discoverer, an adventurer. He ascended the 
Hudson nearly to Albany, stopped to trade at various 
points with the Indians, returned, and sailed out of the 
Narrows again, leaving his own name to our noble river, 



II 

the Hudson. Two years later, in 1611, the great 
Dutch navigator Adriaen Block sailed through Long 
Island Sound, discovering the shores of Connecticut 
and \'isiting Manhattan Island, which had been thus 
named from the tribe of Indians living on it. Block 
published a very graphic account of his voyage ; but the 
haughty East India Company, having failed to find a 
passage to India through the new continent, took no 
further interest in it. 

There were some shrewd merchants in Amsterdam, 
however, not shareholders in the East India Company, 
who saw what a rich trade in furs and other merchan- 
dise might be built up with the new country, and they 
formed a trading company, which was chartered by the 
States-General, the executive or working branch of the 
Dutch government. They built a fort and trading house 
on Manhattan Island, and another on an island in the 
Hudson near the present site of Albany. 

Their charter was limited to three years, counting 
from January i, 161 5, and although they enjoyed a 
profitable trade, they made no permanent settlement. 
This charter is noteworthy from the fact that in it the 
country was first called New Netherlands. 

But in Amsterdam a company was assuming form 
that was destined to effect both settlement and con- 
quest. It was of slow growth, because many people 
objected to granting it a charter conferring such enor- 
mous powers as its promoters asked for ; but at last, on 
June 3, 1621, the very year the truce with Spun ended, 
the States- General chartered it under the name of the 
West India Company. 



12 

Perhaps no body of merchants was ever invested 
with such enormous powers and privileges as this com- 
pany possessed. It was a private company, and yet in 
many respects a sovereign state. It could contract 
alliances, declare war, make peace, administer justice, 
appoint or dismiss governors, judges, and servants, build 
forts, ships, cities — in fact, do anything necessary to pro- 
mote trade and secure stability. To these powers was 
added a monopoly of the trade for the Atlantic coasts 
of Africa and America. Its leaders promised not only 
to carry on trade, but to attack Spain in her American 
colonies and to capture her ships on the high seas, and 
for this reason were given such extensive powers. It 
had a capital of twelve million florins (nearly five million 
dollars of our money), and its affairs were managed by 
five chambers, or boards, distributed among the differ- 
ent cities of Holland, the chamber of Amsterdam being 
the most important. The States-General further gave it 
a grant of the whole magnificent territory discovered by 
Hudson, on condition that it " should advance the peo- 
pling of it." 

The company erected this grant into a province and 
committed its affairs to the chamber of Amsterdam, 
while the other chambers were to devote their attention 
to prosecuting the war against Spain ; and very success- 
ful they were, too, capturing Bahia in 1624, the " great 
silver fleet," conveying treasure from the South Ameri- 
can mines, in 1628, and the rich city of Pernambuco in 
1630. All Netherlands rang with their exploits. 

Meantime, reminded by jealous rivals, the Amster- 
dam chamber did not forget the savage island and the 



13 

** fruitful and unsettled parts " in the West, that its 
charter obliged it to settle, but made an attempt at set- 
tlement by sending" out thirty Walloons to New Nether- 
lands, directing that eight should remain and found a 
trading post at Manhattan, while the remaining twenty- 
two should go up the Hudson to Fort Nassau, near 
Albany, and make a settlement there. This was in 
1624, and these Walloons, residents of the frontier be- 
tween France and Flanders, and distinguished for their 
valor and military spirit, were the first settlers of our 
great city. Next year, however, the company set about 
its task in earnest, advertising for ** adventurers " to the 
New World, and offering free passage, employment, and 
other inducements, insomuch that, toward the close of 
the year, three large ships and a '' yacht " sailed for 
Manhattan, carrying forty-five men, women, and chil- 
dren, with household goods, farming tools, and one 
hundred and three head of cattle. At the same time 
the company began framiing a government for the new 
colony, and appointed a " director," or, as we should say, 
a governor, for it. 



II. THE DUTCH DYNASTY— PETER MINUIT. 



THE director chosen was Peter Minuit of Wesel 
in Westphalia, an old servant of the East India 
Company. He had had experience in governing new 
countries, and this, with a kind, conciliating disposition 
and an inborn faculty for governing, made him one of 
the very best persons for the place that 

have been chosen. He 
t Amsterdam in De- 
cember, 1625, in a 
ship called the Sea 
AIew3.nd bearing a large 




Manhattan 



number of colonists. 
With great joy the busy set- 
at Manhattan on May 4, 1626, 
her furl sail and come to 
anchor off the Battery. A very different 
aspect the island presented to Minuit 
from that it now bears. Primeval for- 
ests hid the Jersey shore and the outline of Manhat- 
tan. A range of low, craggy hills covered with forests 
stretched through the center of the island from the 
Battery to Spuyten Duyvil. There were pretty grassy 
valleys between, and along the shores wide marshes 
stretched away to the north. At the present Canal Street 



15 

they extended quite across the island, so that at very 
high tides the waters of the East River flowed over 
into the Hudson. In sheltered valleys under the crags 
were the cornfields and bark wigwams of the Indians 
and the rude log cabins of the settlers. Cow paths 
crossed the marshes and wound in and out between 
the crags, often penetrating dense thickets of black- 
berry vines, creepers, grapevines, and bushes. Wolves, 
bears, and panthers lurked in these recesses. In their 
letters home the people often complained of the deer 
and wild turkeys that broke in and ate up their crops. 
As his first step Minuit had been directed to purchase 
the island of its Indian owners. He therefore called a 
conference of the chiefs and head men, probably before 
he disembarked his company. You will find in Died- 
rich Knickerbocker's " History of New York " a very 
amusing account of the transaction ; but Knickerbocker's 
sense of humor often played havoc with his historical 
accuracy. The scene as it actually occurred lacked no 
element of the strange and picturesque. On one side 
were the Hollanders, in long-skirted coats, some loose, 
some girt at the waist with a military sash, velvet 
breeches ending at the knee in black Holland stock- 
ings, and on their feet high military boots with wide- 
spreading tops. Their black hats of felt were low in 
the crown, with wide brims which were looped up, 
with rosettes or not at the fancy of the wearer. A 
short sword was suspended in a sash drawn over the 
right shoulder and passing under the left arm, but 
otherwise the Hollanders were without weapons. Op- 
posed to these stern, warlike men were the unkempt, 



i6 

long-haired savages, clad in deerskins or waist belts of 
woven grass. Between the two stood a great sea chest 
with the lid open, revealing therein ribbons, beads, but- 
tons, gayly embroidered coats, and similar articles, which 
were taken out one by one and shown the delighted 
savages, who were only too glad to give their island in 




Purchase of Manhattan Island. 



exchange for the glittering baubles. We can hardly 
believe that the ground on which our opulent city now 
stands was first bought for goods worth twenty-four 
dollars of our money. 

In the midst of savage and fief Minuit now set up his 
orderly government. It was unique in many respects, 
quite different from that of the New England colonies 
on the east, who lived under charters granted by the 
King of England and had their own legislature, which, 
being composed c^f men elected by themselves, acted as 
a check on tlie roval governor. The director, himself 
the servant of the company, enjoyed absolute power, 
except that he could not inflict the death penalty. The 



17 

people had also the right of appeal to the home cham- 
ber, and from its decision to the States-General. An 
advisory council of five of the wisest men of the colony 
was also to be appointed by the governor, to whose 
advice he was to give due weight. There were but two 
other officers of the colony, the secretary of the coun- 
cil and the schout fiscal, the latter as great a figure in 
the early history of Manhattan as the director himself; 
for he was State's attorney, sheriff, constable, and tax 
collector, and beadle and tithingman on Sundays. He 
began the Lord's day by preceding the members of 
the council to church, and during divine service pa- 
trolled the streets to see that no tapster profaned the 




New Amsterdam. 



day by selling schnapps, and no negro slave or Indian 
by gaming. 

The people in general were mere fiefs, or servants, of 
the company. They could not own land ; they could 
not trade with the Indians or among themselves; they 

TODD, N. v.— 2 



i8 

could make nothing, not even what they wore or con- 
sumed, these privileges being reserved for the company. 
After some thirty small cabins had been built along the 
East River, Minuit and his engineer, Kryn Fredericke, 
built a fort on a slight elevation near where Broadway 
now enters the Battery, and called it Fort Amsterdam. 
Then the busy delvers opened quarries in the neighbor- 
ing crags, and built of the '* Manhattan stone " found 
there a warehouse for the company's stores and other 
property. They do not seem to have had the tools for 
building a windmill after the fashion of their fathers, 
and so built a horse mill for grinding grain. For a 
church they fitted up the loft of the horse mill. Minis- 
ter they had none, but the company had sent over two 
zeikentroosters, or " consolers of the sick " (what we 
would call lay readers), who read to them from the 
Bible on Sundays. But in two years a regularly or- 
dained minister, the Rev. Jonas Michaelis, arrived, and 
the little colony was complete. It had taken eighteen 
years to found the settlement. 

Minuit next turned his attention to trading with the 
Indians, and sent a little fleet, composed of a sloop, the 
ship's jolly-boat, and canoes, up the Hudson into every 
bay and creek where an Indian lodge could be seen, 
exchanging axes, knives, beads, and gay fabrics for furs 
and wampum, and inviting the savages to come down 
to the fort and trade with their white brothers. Many 
came, and soon tall, gaunt savages in skins or blankets, 
laden with bales of fur, venison, turkeys, wild fowl, and 
other game, became familiar objects in the streets of 
New Amsterdam : for so Minuit had named his infant 



19 




settlement. Very soon about the company's ware- 
house there was a great bustle of trade indeed, earnest 
of the forthcoming greatness of the 
port. 

When the good ship Arms of Am- 
sterdam sailed for home, September 
23, 1626, she bore '' 7,246 
beaver skins, 178^ otter 
skins, 675 otter skins, 48 mil 
skins, 36 wild-cat skins, 33 minck 
skins, 34 rat skins, and great store of 
oak and hickory timber," the whole 
valued at forty-five thousand guil- 
ders, or some nineteen thousand dol- 
lars. She also took specimens of the 
''summer grain" the colonists had just harvested, viz., 
rye, oats, barley, wheat, beans, flax, buckwheat, and 
canary seed. She carried, too, news of the birth of 
Sarah Rapalje, the "first-born Christian daughter" in 
New Netherlands, born June 9, 1625. 

Minuit knew that the English had settled on Massa- 
chusetts Bay, and he soon sent letters to Governor 
Bradford at Plymouth, proposing trade. The governor 
replied very courteously, saying that at present they had 
need of nothing, but that in the future they might, " if 
the rates were reasonable." At the same time he gen- 
tly intimated that the Dutch were on English soil 
unlawfully ; for England claimed the whole country 
between New England and Virginia west to the Pacific 
by virtue of the earlier discoveries of her sea captains, 
Cabot, John Smith, and others. On a receipt of this 



20 

Minuit sent his beloved secretary, Isaac de Rasicres, in 
the bark N^assaii, with many presents, who came to 
Plymouth, was well received by Governor Bradford, and 
spent many days in the village, being treated '* with 
courtesy and rare good will " by the Pilgrims, and lay- 
ing the foundation for a flourishing trade between the 
two colonies. 

New Amsterdam prospered, however, without Eng- 
lish trade. Six bouweries, or farms, were opened by 
the company in the open meadows along the East River, 
and stocked with sheep, cattle, hogs, and goats, while 
additional colonists were constantly arriving from the 
fatherland. In 1628 there were two hundred and sev- 
enty inhabitants. By 1629 the exports had risen to one 
hundred and thirty thousand guilders, and the imports 
to one hundred and thirteen thousand (about $45,200). 
But neither this progress nor the promise of future rev- 
enues satisfied the directors at home, and after some 
thought they hit upon a plan which promised larger 
and quicker returns. Among their stockholders were 
many wealthy merchants who, they thought, would 
prize a title and an estate. To each of them the direct- 
ors said in effect: " If you will at your own expense 
establish a colony in our territory of New Netherlands 
we will grant you these privileges : a title, that of 
patroon, or feudal chief; an estate, stretching for sixteen 
miles along one bank of the river, or for eight along 
both banks, and extending inland as far as you can 
explore ; exempt you and your people from taxation 
for ten years ; grant you free trade, except in furs, which 
we reserve for ourselves, and full property rights ; pro- 



21 

tect you from enemies, and supply you with servants. 
You shall forever possess and enjoy these lands, with 
the fruits, rights, minerals, rivers, and fountains, the 
fishing and fowling and grinding, the supreme author- 
ity and jurisdiction ; and if you found cities, you shall 
have authority to establish for them officers and magis- 
trates. In return you must agree to satisfy the Indians 
for the land taken; to plant a colony of at least fifty 
souls above fifteen years of age within four years ; to 
provide a minister and schoolmaster for the colony as 
soon as possible, and until that is done a comforter of 
the sick. You may take up the lands anywhere except 
on Manhattan Island, which we reserve for ourselves." 

Several directors and others accepted these terms, 
and thus came into being those great feudal manors and 
patroonships along the Hudson, which after the Revo- 
lution caused much trouble and discord, because in con- 
flict with the spirit of the age. At the time they were 
given, however, they wrought both good and evil : 
good because they provided schools and churches, set- 
tled men in strong, well-ordered villages, and satisfied the 
Indian for his lands ; bad in that they introduced human 
slavery, monopoly of land, and aristocratic privilege. 

The first great patroonship created by this act was 
that of Rensselaerwyck, founded in 1630 by Kiliaen Van 
Rensselaer, a pearl merchant of Amsterdam and a 
director. By successive purchases of the Indians he 
became master of a territory twenty-four miles long by 
forty-eight wide, of an estimated area of seven hundred 
thousand acres. Later it made two counties, Albany and 
Rensselaer, and part of another, Columbia. Michael de 



22 

Pauw, another director, finding the best lands on the 
Hudson taken, purchased in June, 1630, the territory 
called Hoboken- Hacking, across the Hudson from New 
Amsterdam, and the next month Staten Island and the 
country south of his first purchase, now known as Jersey 
City. But these purchases, which included the more 
desirable of the company's lands, aroused the jealousy 
of the other directors who had secured none, and to 
appease them four others were admitted to a share in 
Rensselaerwyck. Settlers, horses, and cattle were soon 
sent to the latter, and in a few years it was a flourishing 
village. Pauw founded on his grant a village which he 
called the " Commune," and which no doubt gave its 
name to the later Communipaw. 

But the company very soon found that the patroons 
were more intent on trading with the Indians than on 
clearing and cultivating their lands, and especially that 
they were buying and selling furs, which trade had 
been reserved as the exclusive right of the company, 
and a bitter quarrel arose over the matter which greatly 
hindered the growth of the colony. So violent did it 
become that it was carried to their High Mightinesses 
the States-General, who passed laws restricting the 
privileges of the patroons. Minuit had ratified the 
patroons' grants, and, it was charged, had in other 
ways favored them at the expense of the company, and 
this, with some minor charges of extravagance, led to his 
recall. He sailed for Holland in the ship EeudracJit, in 
the spring of 1632. He had governed the infant settle- 
ment for six years, in general, it must be admitted, with 
wisdom, sagacity, and prudence. 



III. WOUTER VAN TWILLER. 

AND now the directors sat in their great oak-paneled 
^ chamber in Amsterdam to choose a new governor. 
After much debate they fixed on Wouter Van Twiller as 
the man. You may have read in Diedrich Knicker- 
bocker's " History of New York " that author's famous 
description of him. " He was exactly five feet six 
inches in height and six feet five inches in circumfer- 
ence. His head was a perfect sphere, and of such stu- 
pendous dimensions that Dame Nature, with all her sex's 
ingenuity, would have been puzzled to construct a neck 
capable of supporting it ; wherefore she wisely declined 
the attempt, and settled it firmly on the top of his back- 
bone just between the shoulders. His body was oblong 
and particularly capacious at bottom. His legs were 
short, but sturdy in proportion to the weight they had 
to sustain ; so that, when erect, he had not a little the 
appearance of a beer barrel on skids." 

But, burlesque aside, Van Twiller was a grotesque 
figure, a mountain of flesh, slow and narrow of mind, 
with a petty spirit, and a burgomaster's fondness for 
good dinners and sound wine. He owed his selection 
to the powerful patroon Kiliaen Van Rensselaer, whose 
niece he had married, and who desired for govenor a 
person attached to his interests, 

23 



24 

Van Twiller arrived early in April, 1633. As the 
ship's boat bore him and his retinue ashore, he saw, col- 
lected on the rude wharf, between two and three hun- 
dred men and women with stolid Dutch faces, the 
former clad in baggy, homespun breeches and loose 
blouses well worn and toil-stained, the latter in kerchiefs 
and short gowns; behind them a group of Indians look- 
ing curiously on ; and beyond these crags and the som- 
ber forest, with here and there a clearing or cornfield. 

The director's party took up its quarters in the fort, 
in the houses vacated by Minuit. One day soon after 
his arrival, as he sat with one of the newly arrived 
patroons, De Vries, on the fort parapet, smoking and 
chatting, he saw a vessel pass the Narrows and come up 
the bay with all sail set, round to, and anchor under the 
guns of the fort. Her straight lines and clean, shipshape 
appearance would have proclaimed her nationality even 
if the red cross of England had not flown at her peak. 
Quickly she dispatched a boat ashore in charge of an 
officer in resplendent scarlet uniform. 

"What ship is that?" growled the director, as the 
boat grounded. 

" The William of London, and last from Boston," 
replied the officer, doffing his hat and making a pro- 
found bow. 

"Who commands?" continued the director. 

" Jacob Eelkens," was the reply. 

" I know the varlet," said De Vries, aside; "he was 
post trader at Fort Orange for the first company, and 
was discharged for petty thieving. Have a care, your 
Excellency." 



25 

*' What doeth he here?" continued the director. 

** Prithee, he would trade with the savage," repHed 
the envoy. 

Van Tvviller frowned. Here was the old vexed ques- 
tion of English rights again; like Banquo's ghost, it 
would not down. 

** He hath sent me to present his compliments," con- 
tinued the officer, " and to invite your Excellency and 
the honorable councilors to dine with him to-morrow. 
He bade me say there shall be no lack of good wine 
and ale." 

** Do not go," said De Vries ; but Van Tvviller had a 
weakness for the pleasures of the table, and accepted. 
Accordingly, next day two boats conveyed him, his 
councilors, and De Vries to the William, where they 
were received with due state and ceremony. At the 
dinner which followed, we have it on the authority of 
De Vries, the songs and mad capers of Van Twiller in 
his cups did grievously discredit the Dutch government 
and caused the English to laugh at his authority. 

After lying five days before the fort Eelkens coolly 
announced that he should proceed to Fort Orange and 
trade with his old friends the Mohawks there. The 
conduct of Van Twiller on receiving this startling news 
shows the character of the man. He invited the whole 
crew of the William into the fort, and to overawe them 
ran up the tricolored fiag, and fired a salute in honor of 
the Prince of Orange. But Eelkens, so far from being 
frightened, laughed and sent his gunner on board the 
William, with orders to fire a whole broadside in honor 
of King Charles; then, while the guns were still thun- 



26 

dering, he hurried aboard with his crew, weighed anchor, 
and sailed up the river, his men twirhng their thumbs at 
the Dutch, who stood petrified with astonishment, mak- 
ing no attempt to hinder them. Van Twiller was the 
first to recover his w^its. He called for a barrel of wine, 
broached it, and invited the entire populace — which had 
come running to the spot on the sound of the guns — to 
join him in drinking it ; then, made valiant by the wine, 
he swung his hat and shouted : ** All ye who love the 
Prince of Orange and me, emulate me in this, and aid 
me in repelling the violence of that Englishman." 

As soon as possible three armed vessels w^ere made 
ready, and, with one hundred and four men at arms on 
board, the director stood up the river in pursuit. In the 
meantime Eelkens had arrived at a point about a mile 
below Fort Orange (Albany), where he raised a mar- 
quee, landed his cargo, and began a profitable trade with 
the Mohawks, who were delighted to meet again their 
old friend and ally. News of his invasion was quickly 
carried to Houten, the Dutch official in charge of Fort 
Orange, and he hastened down in his shallop, " wTeathed 
in green boughs, with a trumpeter making stirring 
music," and set up a rival booth beside the interloper's, 
and did what he could to disparage his wares and hinder 
his trade. But Eelkens had new and superior goods, 
purchased with full knowledge of what the Indians re-, 
quired, and was fast disposing of his cargo when, four- 
teen days after his arrival, the Dutch fleet, which we left 
at New Amsterdam, hove in sight. 

As soon as its commander could secure the aid of the 
soldiers in Fort Orange he sailed down to the English 



^7 

marquee, and commanded Eelkens to take his goods and 
begone forthwith. But the trader not responding so 
quickly as he wished, he ordered his men to beat and 
disperse the Indians who were trading with him; then, 
unheeding Eelkens's protests that he was on English 
soil and had a right to trade there, they pulled his tent 
about his ears, and hurried his goods on board the Wt7- 
liain, " sounding in their boat meantime a trumpet in 
disgrace of the English." Then they escorted the Wil- 
liam to the mouth of the river, or, to use Eelkens's 
words: '* The Dutch came along with us in their shal- 
lop, and they sticked green bowes all about her, and 
drank strong waters, and sounded their trumpet in a 
triumphing manner over us." Thus a second time the 
English were defeated in asserting their claim to the 
Hudson ; but in the end they triumphed, as we shall see. 
Van Twiller soon had a deeper quarrel on his hands, 
this time with the English of Plymouth and Massachu- 
setts Bay. Both nations laid claim to the Connecticut 
River and its rich valley lands, the Dutch by virtue of 
Block's discovery, the English by grant of their king. 
To strengthen their claim, the Dutch, in 1632, had pur- 
chased of the Indians the lands near the mouth of the 
river, and Van Twiller now sent his commissary, Jacob 
Van Curler, to buy a large tract on the upper river, on 
the site of the present city of Hartford, and further 
built there a trading post armed with two cannon, call- 
ing it the House of Good Hope. The English met this 
by establishing settlements on the Connecticut, where- 
upon Van Twiller sent an armed force of seventy men 
to clear the river; but they returned without striking a 



28 

blow, finding the English " very warlike, and the woods 
full of painted savages." This ended the doughty gov- 
ernor's campaigns against the English on the Connecti- 
cut, though both he and his successors continued to 
assert their claim to the " Great River." 

In conducting the internal affairs of his little kingdom 
Van Twiller was more fortunate. He had some trouble 
with the powerful patroons, but no serious difficulty ; he 
placated the Indians; he erected many public buildings 
and works, and he saw new farms and villages springing 
up about him. The patroon Pietersen de Vries pur- 
chased Staten Island and founded a colony there. The 
Walloon settlement, the first on the present site of 
Brooklyn, grew apace. Van Twiller completed Fort 
Amsterdam, and built a substantial dwelling of brick 
within it for himself, a parsonage and stables also for 
the Domine Bogardus, a country house for himself on 
his plantation, a brewery and boathouse, several mills, 
and dwellings for the smith, cooper, corporal, and other 
officers, all at the expense of the company. But when 
his bills were presented the directors objected, and 
partly on this account, partly because of charges made 
by De Vries and others that he was diverting the moneys 
of the company to his own use, the directors removed 
him, and appointed in his place Wilhelm Kieft, who took 
the oath of office at Amsterdam, September 2, 1637. 



IV. WILHELM KIEFT. 

AS soon as news of this reached New Amsterdam 
i the people there began to talk about Kieft. They 
said he had become bankrupt as a merchant in Holland, 
and had been condemned to have his portrait fixed to 
the gallows, and when later he had been minister to 
Turkey he had kept the funds sent him to ransom 
Christian captives from the Turk, and left them to lan- 
guish in captivity. They whispered such things as the 
new governor and his party stepped from the bark 
Blessing, on the 28th of March, 1638. The bystanders 
saw a little man with sharp, pinched features, a cold 
gray eye, a furtive, suspicious look and autocratic air; 
a man of good natural abilities, but undisciplined, of 
peppery temper, selfish, conceited, and tyrannical; the 
very man to embroil himself with his subjects, and his 
subjects with their neighbors. This he proceeded to do 
with great facility. He made oppressive and vexatious 
sumptuary laws, — that is, laws directing what the people 
should eat and what they should drink, and when they 
should sleep, — and as he enforced them with great 
rigor the whole colony was soon up in arms against him. 
Not liking the check imposed on him by the council, he 
dissolved it by a trick. The directors had given him 

the power of fixing the number of men in this council, 

29 



30 

and he now limited it to one, and then ordained that his 
council should have but one v^ote in the government, 
while he had two. This practically made him dictator, 
for the right of appeal to Amsterdam was very little used 
because of the distance, delay, and expense. Next he 
embroiled himself and the colony with the Indians by 
making a law that they should pay tribute, and when 
they refused tried to compel them by force. The result 
was what a wiser man would have foreseen. The peo- 
ple openly violated the oppressive laws, and very soon 
Kieft had an Indian war on his hands, a state of affairs 
which the former governors had sought above all things 
to avoid. 

One day in 1640 word came that some swine running 
at large in the forests of Staten Island were missing, 
and the director, without inquiry, charged that the 
Raritan Indians had stolen them, and sent out a com- 
pany of troops with orders to kill, burn, and destroy. 
Glad of the opportunity, the soldiers hurried into the 
Raritan country, burned their villages and cornfields, 
and only refrained from killing the Indians because they 
could not find them. In revenge the Raritans de- 
scended on the bouwery of the innocent, humane 
De Vries on Staten Island, killed four of his planters, 
and burned his house and tobacco barn. At this, 
frenzied with rage, Kieft offered his allies, the River 
Indians, ten fathoms of wampum for every head of a 
Raritan, and twenty fathoms each for the heads of the 
murderers of the planters. This set hundreds of human 
hounds on the trail, and in a few days Pacham, chief of 
the Tankitikes, who lived about Sing Sing, came in 



31 

with the head of the chief who had slain De Vries's 
men dangHng at the end of a stick. At the same time 
the Raritans came in and begged for mercy. A few 
weeks after it was learned that the swine had been taken 
by a party of the company's servants on their way to 
Virginia. 

On another morning, Claes Smit, the village wheel- 
wright, who lived alone in a little house in the suburbs, 
was found murdered in his bed, and it was discovered 
that he had been killed by a Weckquaesgeck Indian 
whose uncle had been slain by negro slaves of the com- 
pany twenty years before, and who had waited thus 
long for an opportunity to make the blood atonement 
which Indian custom laid on the next of kin in such 
cases. Kieft promptly demanded the murderer from 
the Weckquaesgeck chief, but the latter refused. 
He was sorry, he said, that tw^enty Christians had 
not been killed. The blood of his relative cried from 
the ground for vengeance, and was not yet appeased. 

Kieft would have marched an army against the tribe 
at once, but was deterred by the protests and threats of 
De Vries and other leaders, who reminded him that they 
were two hundred and fifty men at arms against ten 
thousand savages, and asked him if he wished to pro- 
voke a general Indian war. 

Alarmed at the turn affairs had taken, the director 
now called a meeting of the patroons and head men, 
and asked their advice. The latter, quick to take ad- 
vantage of the occasion, chose a council of twelve wise 
men to advise the director in this and other emergencies, 
much to the latler's disgust. In the present case they 



32 

advised against declaring war at once, for three reasons : 
their cattle were still in the woods, their crops unhar- 
vested, and their people scattered about on the. farms; 
in the winter, they said, these conditions would not 
exist. Kieft therefore staid the uplifted battle-ax, 
though sorely against his will. 

In January the twelve gave their consent, and at the 
same time called his attention to certain evils and abuses 
in his government which they hoped would be remedied ; 
they also asked for certain concessions to popular rights, 
a council being one of them. Kieft received them 
kindly and promised fairly, but a day or two after 
issued a proclamation dissolving the council, which he 
said had been called to consult on the Indian crisis, which 
now being done, he thanked them for their trouble, and 
would make use of their advice " with God's help and 
fitting time." The paper concluded by sternly forbid- 
ding further meetings, which ** tended to the great injury 
both of the country and of our authority." 

Being now again supreme ruler, the director ordered 
Hendrik Van Dyck, his ensign, to march with eighty 
soldiers against the Weckquaesgecks and harry them 
with fire and sword. The valiant ensign and his party 
set out with stout hearts, but became entangled in the 
vast forests, and returned without having seen a W'eck- 
quaesgeck. The campaign served its purpose, however, 
for the savages, hearing of the danger they had barely 
escaped, came in and sued for mercy. 

Kieft now became even more reckless and arbitrary in 
his government, disdaining all counsel, insomuch that in 
1643 the infant settlement was confronted with a general 



33 

Indian war. The River Indians, the Connecticut and 
Long Island tribes, formed an alliance to destroy the 
Dutch, fifteen hundred savages against two hundred and 
fifty white men. Soon the outlying farms and villages 
were attacked and burned, and such of the inhabitants 
as were not killed sent flying to the fort for safety. In 
this crisis Kieft acted like one bereft of reason ; he sent 
his soldiers up the Hudson and into Connecticut and 
Long Island with orders to slaughter the Indians, men, 
women, and children, wherever they could be found, to 
burn their villages and destroy their cornfields. Mur- 
ders most inhuman were committed under his orders, 
and all the murders wxre avenged either then, or later 
by the allied tribes. 

Meantime petition after petition had been sent to the 
home company detailing Kieft's crimes and unjust acts. 



-om 








Stadt Huys. 



and praying for his recall ; but so powerful was the in- 
fluence of the great patroon Van Rensselaer with the di- 
rectors that for a long time no notice of them was taken. 
At length, in the spring of 1645, the colonists threat- 

TODD, N. Y.— 3 



34 

ened to leave in a body unless he was recalled, and this, 
together with the influence of the w^ise and humane 
patroon De Vries, who had returned to Holland in 
disgust, led the chamber to remove Kieft and appoint 
Petrus Stuyvesant in his place. Over against the evil 
that Kieft wrought may be set much good that he 
did ; for he certainly did much to make Manhattan more 
beautiful and habitable. He repaired the fort, erected 
public buildings, set out orchards and gardens and en- 
couraged others to do so, straightened the streets and 
made laws for keeping them cleaner. One of his build- 
ings was the great stone tavern which later became the 
Stadt Huys, or City Hall, and he began and nearly 
finished, within the fort, the large stone church which 
was for many years the city's only house of worship. 



V. PETRUS STUYVESANT. 

IT was over two years before a new governor came, 
so that long before his arrival his personal history, 
character, and appearance had been described and can- 
vassed. He was a native of Friesland, it was said, son 
of a clergyman there. Bred to the profession of arms, 
he had early entered the service of the West India Com- 
pany, and won renown in those brilliant battles, sieges, 
naval combats, and predatory descents on the Spanish- 
American coasts, which gained glory for the company 
and abundantly filled its coffers. Later, as governor 
of Curasao, he undertook to conquer the island of 
Saint Martin, but having lost a leg in the action, he 
returned to Holland for surgical advice ; and the direct- 
ors, being then in search of a governor for their mis- 
managed colony, fixed upon this victorious commander 
and martinet. 

The people of Manhattan were not very well pleased 
with his appointment ; they feared he would be as 
tyrannical as Kieft, and regarded his selection as proof 
that the company meant to continue its despotic form 
of government. However, anything was to be preferred 
to their present condition, and they waited hopefully for 
the coming of their new master. He arrived on the 
J ith of May, 1647, with a fleet of four large ships and 

35 



36 

a noble company : his beautiful and accomplished wife, 
his widowed sister, Mrs. Bayard, and her three boys, a 
vice director, a council which had been appointed by the 
chamber in Amsterdam as a check on the director, men 
at arms, and colonists. The fleet had been on the way 
since Christmas, having made a detour to the West 
Ind es on some affair of Stuvvesant's. 

As the director came to land, the fort thundered a 
salute, the people w^aved hats and handkerchiefs, and 
Kieft, advancing, read an address of welcome, to which 
the new ruler responded. 

Neither his words nor his manner pleased the people ; 
the latter, they said, seemed too much like that of a 
prince addressing conquered subjects. In his speech he 
said to them : " I shall be in my government as a father 
over his children, for the advantage of the privileged 
West India Company, the burghers, and the country." 

Stuyvesant assumed the reins of government on the 
27th of May, and his words and manner on that occa- 
sion w^ere still less to their liking. " He kept the peo- 
ple standing more than an hour wnth their heads uncov- 
ered, while he wore his chapeau as though he were the 
Czar of Muscovy," said an eyewitness. At the same 
time he announced his council, which had been appointed 
in Holland, as w^e have seen. The former secretary and 
schout fiscal w^ere retained ; two new offices had been 
created, a master of equipage and an English secre- 
tary and interpreter. He further told them that the 
company had established a court of justice, of which 
Van Dinclage was to be judge, but from whose decisions 
an appeal might be taken to himself. 



37 

Stuyvesattt ruled with a high hand. Almost his first 
official act showed the people that they could expect 
little more liberty under him than under Kieft. There 
was living in New Amsterdam at this time a very re- 
spectable gentleman named Cornells Melyn, who had 
been president of that council which had been appointed 
by the patroons and chief men under Kieft. He had lost 
heavily in the Indian war at that time, and now, with 
Joachim Pietersen Kuyter, also a member of the same 
council, petitioned that the causes of that war might be 
inquired into, and that the testimony of citizens might 
be taken under oath. 

Stuyvesant believed that the government should be 
upheld, right or wTong ; he appointed the commission as 
desired, but himself went before it and said that in his 
opinion '' the two malignant fellows wxre disturbers of 
the peace, and that it was treason to complain of one's 
magistrates, whether there was cause or not," where- 
upon the commission refused the petition. At this, 
Kieft, seeing that the director was on his side, had the 
two burghers arrested on a charge of " rebellion and 
sedition." Justice was pretty swift in those days, so the 
two unfortunates were quickly haled before the newly 
created court, where Stuyvesant sat with Judge Van 
Dinclage to try them. There were then no lawyers in 
New Netherlands, and the prisoners pleaded their own 
case, and did it ably too. They proved the truth of 
their charges against Kieft, and that in making them 
they were not moved by vindictive motives. Yet in 
spite of this, and against law and evidence, the judges 
declared them guilty. Melyn declared that he would 



38 

appeal to the States-General. This threw Stuyvesant 
into a violent rage. He stamped about on his wooden 
leg, with " the foam on his beard," and said to Melyn : 
" Were I persuaded that you would bring this matter 
before their High Mightinesses, I would have you 
hanged on the highest tree in New^ Netherlands." Next 
he pronounced sentence : for Melyn seven years' ban- 
ishment and a fine of three hundred guilders, and for 
Kuyter banishment for three years and a fine of one 
hundred and fifty guilders. 

A few days after the trial the banished men were put 
aboard the ship Princess, bound for Holland. With 
them sa led over one hundred souls. Kieft was among 
them, and Domine Bogardus, with many who were dis- 
satisfied with the government as administered by the 
new director. But the Princess was w-recked in a great 
storm on the wild Welsh coast. Kieft and Domine 
Bogardus went down in the swirling waters. Only 
Melyn, Kuyter, and some eighteen others escaped. 

When Melyn and Kuyter, after long delay, brought 
their case before the States-General, Stuyvesant's judg- 
ment w^as revoked, and Melyn and Kuyter were sent 
back with a summons to him from the Prince of Orange 
and the States-General ordering him to appear and an- 
swer before them, either in person or by his attorney ; 
but the matter seems to have been compounded, as we 
hear no more of it. 

The great event of Stuyvesant's reign, save perhaps 
the last, was the granting of the charter which made 
New Amsterdam a city, and which w^as given in 1652, 
in answer to repeated complaints and petitions of the 



39 

citizens. It was on the plan of the ancient charter of 
old Amsterdam, which provided for the election by the 
people of a schout, four burgomasters, nine schepens, 
and an advisory council of thirty-six men. The first 
fourteen constituted a body similar to the English mayor 
and common council, and made and executed the laws by 
which the city was governed. They were also a court 
for the trial of civil and criminal cases. In this charter 
of New Amsterdam, however, the company limited the 
number of burgomasters to two and of schepens to five, 
but declared expressly that they should be elected by 
the people. 

Stuyvesant, however, largely nullified the charter by 
appointing the city fathers instead of allowing the people 
to elect them, and after he had appointed them told them 
plainly that he should preside at their meetings when- 
ever he deemed it necessary, and advise them in matters 
of importance. And so with an autocratic, self-willed 
military commander as governor, the people found the 
piece of parchment of little avail. They had the shadow 
of self-government, however, if not the substance. 

The old stone tavern built by Kieft was cleaned, 
remodeled, and set apart as a stadt huys, or city hall, 
and there the burgomasters and schepens held their 
sessions. 

Stuyvesant proclaimed the city on the 2d of Febru- 
ary, 1653. It then comprised some fifteen hundred in- 
habitants and about three hundred houses, mostly of 
wood, with a few of stone. It had no trade of its own, 
and there was scarcely cleared land enough about it to 
supply it with vegetables. Is it not wonderful that in 



40 

two centuries and a half this village has grown to be the 
metropolis of the western continent and the second 



li^'^f^^ 









City of New Amsterdam, 1653. 

largest city in the world? In 1654 Stuyvesant pre- 
sented the city with its long-delayed seal, the occasion 
being a banquet held in the council chamber by the 
burgomasters and schepens on the eve of his departure 
for a visit of ceremony to the West Indies. The guests 
all crowded round to view it. It bore the arms of old 
Amsterdam, three crosses saltire, with a beaver for a 
crest, and above, on the mantle, the initial letters 
C. W. I. C, meaning the " Chartered West India Com- 
pany." Within a wreath of laurel was the legend, 
Sigillmn Amstelodajuensis in Novo Bclgio ('* Seal of 
Amsterdam in New Belgium "). 

Stuyvesant returned in July, and shortly after, 



41 

under orders from Holland, embarked with an army of 
seven hundred men to drive off certain Swedes who, in 
Minuit's time, had settled on the banks of the South 
River, on lands claimed by the Dutch. A few days after 
the fleet sailed, the ex-sheriff, Van Dyck, discovered an 
Indian woman stealing peaches in his orchard, and shot 
her dead on the spot. Her people at once sent swift 
runners to all the river tribes, to the Connecticut and 
Long Island Indians, praying for vengeance, and ap- 
prising them that the director and all the able-bodied 
men of the city were absent. 

The savages at once sprang to arms, and just before 
daybreak on September 15, 1655, appeared before the 
city in sixty-four canoes bearing nineteen hundred 
warriors. They quickly spread through the town, and 
broke into a few houses on pretense of looking for 
hostile Indians, but really to see if the murderer Van 
Dyck was in the city. The burgomasters and sche- 
pens, aroused, went among them, gathered the chiefs 
into the fort, and with soothing and persuasive words 
induced them to draw their men out of the city. They 
retired to Nutten (now Governors) Island, but quickly 
returned, hurried to the house of Van Dyck, and killed 
him. The schepen. Van der Grist, who lived next door, 
hastened to the sheriff's aid, and was stricken down with 
an ax. By this time the alarm had been given ; the 
burgher guard sprang to arms, and drove the Indians 
off, killing several. 

Stung to fury by this loss, the savages hurried to 
Hoboken and Pavonia, across the Hudson, killed every 
person they could find, and ravaged the plantations, 



42 

then hastened to the unfortunate settlements of De 
Vries on Staten Island, where the same scenes were 
enacted — a heavy price to pay for one man's rash and 
cruel act. 

Stuyvesant had just received the submission of the 
Swedes w^hen a courier brought the news of this Indian 
foray, whereupon he returned at once, but acted wnth 
much more wisdom than Kieft had shown on a similar 
occasion. He called the chiefs together, and by kind 
words and presents allayed their just resentment and 
restored confidence. 

The later years of Stuyvesant's term were marked by 
religious persecution, before unknown in New Nether- 
lands. " Allow all the free exercise of their religion in 
their ow^n houses," had been the command of the com- 
pany ; but the director would recognize only the Dutch 
Reformed Church. He persecuted both the Lutherans 
of Holland and the Quakers and Baptists of New Eng- 
land. These and other cruelties so incensed the people 
tliat Stuyvesant had scarcely a friend in his government 
outside of his official family. 

He was very soon to feel the efTect of this hostility. 
England, as we have remarked, had never yielded her 
claim to the territory covered by New Netherlands. 
By the year 1664 she believed the time had come for 
gathering it to herself. 

All through the reign of Stuyvesant events had been 
leading up to this end. Charles I. of England had been 
deposed and beheaded. Cromwell had had his day as 
Protector, and after his death the monarchy had been 
restored in the person of Charles II., who was now king. 



43 

He was a weak man, and the management of foreign 
affairs had fallen largely into the hands of his abler 
brother James, the Duke of York, and of the strong, 
statesmanlike men whom the king had selected as his 
ministers. From the moment that Charles felt secure 
on his throne, aggressions against this little strip of 
Dutch territory began. In 1664, ignoring some former 
grants, Charles gave to his brother James the entire ter- 
ritory claimed by the Dutch ; and at once that energetic 
nobleman set about getting possession of the grant, a 
work in which he had the active aid and encouragement 
of King Charles's ministers. 

That the seizure might cause a war with Holland did 
not trouble him in the least; he disliked the Dutch for 
various reasons ; besides, a war would focus national 
attention upon himself, and already he had his eye on 
the throne of England. Four men-of-war, the Guinea 
of thirty-six guns, the Elias of thirty, the Martiji of 
sixteen, and the Williani-and-NicJiolas of ten, were bor- 
rowed from the government, and, manned w^ith four 
hundred and fifty men at arms, were placed under com- 
mand of Colonel Richard Nicolls, a veteran officer and a 
courteous, humane gentleman. 

This fleet left Portsmouth, England, about the middle 
of May, 1664, having on board a form of government 
and laws for the territory when it should be taken. So 
sure wiere they of capturing it that Nicolls bore orders to 
the governors of the New England colonies directing 
them to aid in the movement. The fleet reached Bos- 
ton late in July, and its commander asked for the aid 
of Massachusetts and Connecticut in carrying out his 



44 

design. Massachusetts had Httle love for King Charles, 
and responded somewhat tardily, but Connecticut, which 
had had a great deal of trouble with the Dutch on her 
western border, gladly aided the enterprise. 

Stuyvesant was away on a visit to Fort Orange when 
news that the English were about to attack his capital 
reached him, and he at once hurried back. Twenty- 
four hours after reaching home, as he paced restlessly 
the parapet of the fort, he saw far down in the lower 
bay the dim outlines of a man-of-war from whose peak 
floated the red cross flag of Saint George ; it was the 
Gitiuea, leading the fleet to the attack. Never before had 
a commander been caught so unprepared : there were 
no provisions for a siege; of the thirteen hundred 
pounds of powder in the fort six hundred were useless; 
of the garrison of one hundred and fifty regular soldiers 
and two hundred and fifty militia the director was not 
sure of the loyalty of one. 

Stuyvesant fumed and stamped about on his wooden 
leg. He swore that he would hold the town against all 
odds, and he began active though tardy preparations for 
defense. JHe mustered his four hundred men, and or- 
dered every third man among the citizens to repair to 
the defenses with spade, shovel, or wheelbarrow. 

But the latter murmured at this. Was the director 
crazy, they asked, that he thought of defense? Sup- 
pose he held the fort, did he not know that the frigates 
could pass up the river and rake the town on either 
side ? 

Many refused to go. Perhaps a third of the pop- 
ulation were English-speaking people, in sympathy 



45 

with Nicolls, and these now went about the city spread- 
ing disaffection and working on the fears of the people. 
Nevertheless, Stuyvesant continued his preparations : 
he placed a guard at the city gates; he ordered the 
brewers to cease making grain into malt, and set his 
slaves to thrashing grain at his farm and conveying it 
to the fort. 

Meantime the fleet anchored in the bay and sent a 
summons to the director to surrender. Stuyvesant 
called a council of the burgomasters and schepens, who 
advised delay and the sending of commissioners to 
argue the matter with the invaders. This was done. 
But Nicolls told them plainly that he was not come to 
argue, but to execute. The council then asked three 
days to consider, which was at once given, as it gave the 
humane commander the opportunity he desired. He 
took advantage of the delay to move his vessels abreast 
of Governors Island, where he disembarked five com- 
panies of soldiers and sent them to effect a junction with 
a party of horse and foot from Connecticut and Long 
Island, after which the allied force encamped on the 
Brooklyn shore by the present terminus of F'ulton 
Ferry. Nicolls was very desirous of taking the place 
without bloodshed, as his object was to placate the 
Dutch and make them contented and orderly subjects 
of the King of England. He now issued a proclamation 
offering to all who would submit life, liberty, property, 
and the fullest enjoyment of every right whether of 
person or estate. This paper he distributed throughout 
the city by means of his agents, and awaited the result. 
The people read it or heard of it, and urged the di- 



46 

rector to submit ; but he refused, and hurried on liis 
preparations for defense. 

The original demand had been made on Saturday, 
August 30. The three days' grace would expire on 
Wednesday morning, September 3. On Tuesda}/ morn- 
ing a rowboat was seen approaching from the fleet. It 
contained six dignified gentlemen of commanding pres- 
ence, conspicuous among them the noble figure of Gov- 
ernor Winthrop of Connecticut, whom Stuyvesant had 
several times met at banquet board and council table 
— an embassy bent on efi'ecting a bloodless surrender. 
They were met at the wharf with due courtesy, a salute 
being fired in their honor, and conducted to the Stadt 
Huvs, where Stuvvesant and his council were waitinsf tO' 
receive them. Winthrop broached their mission, and 
with his well-known eloquence urged the director to 
give over a hopeless struggle and spare useless shedding 
of blood by yielding the city to the English. 

But the lion-hearted director swore he would never 
submit. Winthrop then delivered a letter from Colonel 
Nicolls, which was read to the council, in which he 
promised that the Dutch should have full liberty equally 
with the king's subjects to settle in New Netherlands 
and to trade with their own country or return thither. 

A great crowd of citizens had gathered outside to 
hear the result, and the burgomasters now asked that 
the letter might be read to them ; but Stuyvesant, who 
feared its effect, refused. A war of words ensued, and 
in the midst of it the choleric director seized the letter 
and tore it to pieces. At this Cornelis Steenwyck, a 
member of the council, roundly denounced him, and 



47 

with his fellow-officials quitted the place. On gaining 
the street they told the people what had taken place, 
and the latter presently deputed three prominent men 
among them to call upon the director and demand the 
letter. In reply the latter showed them the fragments, 
but on the delegates still demanding the letter, he went 
out to the people and tried to reason with them ; but his 
voice was drowned in angry shouts for the letter. 

*' That," said Stuyvesant, " was addressed to the offi- 
cers of government, and does not concern you." But 
the people were not to be placated, and amid bitter 
curses and threats Stuyvesant withdrew to the fort, 
while Nicholas Bayard, the politic courtier, pieced the 
torn fragments of the letter together, and from it made 
a copy which he read to the people, who were little 
appeased by it, and still clamored for submission. 
Meantime Stuyvesant, in the fort, was writing another 
letter to Nicolls, in which he gave an exhaustive account 
of the Dutch discovery and settlement of New Nether- 
lands, and forcibly stated their claims to it. He sealed 
it and sent it by four of his most trusted friends. 

*' Nay," said Nicolls, when the envoys reached his 
ship, " I stand on no question of right ; if my terms 
are not accepted I must carry out my orders and 
attack." 

The delegates still wished to argue, but Nicolls cut 
them short. ** On Thursday I shall speak with you at 
the Manhattans," he said significantly. 

" Thou wilt be welcome if thou comest as a friend," 
replied the envoys. 

" I will come with my ships and my soldiers, and he 



48 

will be a bold messenger who will dare to come on 
board and solicit terms," said Nicolls. 

" What then is to be done? " they asked. 

" Hoist the white flag over the fort, and I may take 
it into consideration," was the reply. He promised 
that he would not fire upon the city without warning, 
but refused their request not to move his troops nearer 
the city. ** To-day I shall arrive at the ferry," he 
added; ** to-morrow we can agree with one another." 

That same day he landed three companies of regulars 
at Gravesend, and marched overland at their head to 
the Fulton Ferry, where he formed a junction with the 
troops already there. While this was being done two 
of the frigates sailed up past the forfwith ports open 
and guns shotted, ready to pour in a broadside if its 
guns should open. Stuyvesant stood on the parapet as 
they passed, and would have ordered his gunners to fire, 
no doubt, for he was not lacking in courage, had not 
Domine Megapolensis at the critical moment laid his 
hand upon his shoulder. *' It is madness," said he. 
" What can our twenty guns do against the sixty-two 
pointed toward us from yonder frigates? W^ill you be 
the first to shed blood? " 

Once they were past, however, the director's resolu- 
tion returned, and taking one hundred soldiers, he hur- 
ried up into the city to resist any attempt of the English 
to land. But as he came into the town he was met by 
a petition signed by ninety-three prominent citizens, 
includincr the ma^jistrates and clerov be""£^inq- him to 
accept the generous terms of the English and save the 
city from burning, and the people from the sword. 



49 

Women and children also came and pleaded that he 
would save them from the violence of a sack, until at 
last the grim old veteran, hero of a hundred battles, 
gave way. 

'' I had rather be carried to my grave," he said, but 
he ordered the white flag raised on the fort. 

And thus peaceably fell New Amsterdam in the 
year of our Lord 1664. 

The articles of capitulation were agreed on next morn- 
ing. They provided that free intercourse with Holland 
was to continue, that citizens of every race and creed 
were to be secured in person, property, customs, and re- 
ligion. Stuyvesant and his men were to march out with 
drums beating, colors flying, and matchlocks lighted, 
and embark on the vessel which was to bear them to the 
fatherland. 

This program was fully carried out on the 8th of Sep- 
tember, 1664. As the Dutch marched out the English 
entered, and raised their red cross flag over the fort and 
public buildings. Nicolls was proclaimed governor, the 
fort rechristened James, in honor of the duke, and the 
province named New York for the same reason. 

The United Provinces exclaimed loudly against the 
injustice of the conquest, and waged a long and bloody 
war with England because of it. Stuyvesant, too, was 
blamed for yielding up the fort, but hurried to Amster- 
dam and made a strong defense. Afterwards, his 
family, his property, and friends being in New York, he 
returned, and lived many years in his fine old country- 
house, which stood near the corner of what is now Third 
Avenue and Twelfth Street. There he died in 1672, 

TODD, N. Y.— 4 



50 



one of the heroic figures of his age. His house, garden, 
anci bouwery continued to be for many years one of the 
landmarks of the city. The house was of wood, two 
stories Iiigh, with projecting story, and stood about 
one hundred and fifty feet east of Third Avenue and 

forty feet north of 
Twelfth Street. In 
front of it was the 
garden, laid out in 
quaint old Dutch 
st}le with formal 
paths and flower 
beds describing al- 
most every geomet- 
rical figure. In this 
garden, near the 
house, Stuyvesant 
planted a pear tree, 
which for more than 
two hundred years 
kept his memory 
green and indicated 
to passers-by the 
site of his dwelling. 
Generation after gen- 
eration of his des- 
cendants grew up and passed away. Year by year 
the city crept steadily northward, invaded his farm, 
and caused streets to be laid out through his garden ; 
then the old pear tree, still green, vigorous, and fruitful, 
found itself at the corner of Third Avenue and Thirteenth 




Stuyvesant's Pear Tree. 



51 

Street. Then careful hands placed an iron railing about 
it to protect it. At la.st, after it had stood on the corner 
for sixty years, it was blown down in a great storm 
in February, 1867, and the last memento of the lion- 
hearted governor ceased to exist. 

His widow, Judith Bayard, lived on in the old man- 
sion until her death in 1687, ^^^ founded by will the 
present Saint Mark's Church, which stands on a part of 
the Stuy vesant farm, and in which the ashes of the gov- 
ernor rest. 



VI. DUTCH MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 

IF in the preceding pages we have spoken Httle of the 
Hfe of the people, it was from our desire to present a 
clear and connected idea of the founding of our noble 
city and of the causes which led up to it, and not be- 
cause we deemed such details tri\ial or unimportant. 

For a generation the life of the pioneers was rude and 
hard. They dwelt at first in tents and dugouts, later m 
small, one-room cabins with thatched straw roofs and 
chimneys of small, square sticks mortared with mud. 
There was much hard and rude w(jrk to be done ; forests 
were to be cleared, lands drained, plowed, and sowed, 
quarries opened, a fort, brickkilns, houses, flouring mills, 
and sawmills built, and streets and roads laid out and 
paved. 

By 1664, however, New Amsterdam had become a 
city wnth not A few of the amenities and refinements of 
civilized life. Let us imagine that we stroll through it 
some beautiful June morning in 1664, and look upon 
the burghers at their w^ork and play. 

We might have come over from Brooklyn by the 
rowboat ferry which then landed near the present Peck 
Slip. As we stepped ashore we should have seen both 
cleared fields and forests about us. Though the " fferry 
road'* wound south^ following the present line of Pearl 

^2 



« 



Street, which then ran along the pebbly beach of the East 
River, the streets now lying between — Water, South, 
and Front — were then crossed by the tide. At what is 
now Maiden Lane we should have come upon a foot- 
path which here crossed our road, coming down to the 
river from Broadway, and skirting the shores of several 
clear-water ponds fed by springs, their combined outlet 
being a little brook that came leaping gayly down to join 
the river; and here a pretty scene would have presented 
itself. A bevy of beautiful maidens, with bare, dimpled 
arms, are wetting linen in the basins, and spreading it 
in the sun on the verdant slope of the hill to the west, 
chatting volubly the while in their musical tongue. 
Their own fingers have spun the linen from the flax and 
woven it in the loom, and now they are spreading it in 
the sun to bleach. They and their mothers before them 
formed the path, 
hence called Maagde 
Paatje ('* Maidens' 
Path "), which the 
English changed to 
our present Maiden 
Lane. 

Pleased and inter- 
ested, we should have 
journeyed on, and at 
the present line of 
Wall Street would have been stopped abruptly by a 
blank wall of palisades — great timbers twelve feet high, 
set three feet deep in the earth, with stout posts at every 
rod, rising two feet above the palisades, to which split 




The Wall, 1664. 



54 

rails were nailed, thus forming" a fence two feet abov( 
the tops of the pahsades. Before us would have been 
an arched gateway, the key of the arch being carved 
with strange-looking figures and crowned with a cu- 
pola and gilded weathercock. Let us imagine that the 
great nail-studded oaken gate is open, and we enter. 
Once within, we examine the wall more closely. At 
the water's edge on the east is a square blockhouse 
with holes between the timbers for muskets, and a 
" half-moon " or semicircular battery projecting into the 
water and mounting two cannon, one pointing up the 
river, the other down. 




Foot of Wall Street. 1674. 



■ There is a guard here, a single soldier in loose gray 
olouse and baggy breeches, with an ancient flintlock 
musket thrown over his shoulder. These blockhouses 
are placed at intervals along the wall quite over to the 
Hudson, while at Broadway there is another gate and 
arched gateway. Without is a chevaux-de-frise of 
stumps with their fanglike roots upturned, and within 
a broad ditch and a sod rampart. 

The guard at the gate tells us that the wall is 2,340 
feet long, that it cost 3,166 guilders, and was built in 
1653, when the people feared a descent from the Eng- 
lish and hostile Indians on the north. Thanking the 
sentry, we are about to continue, when we are beset by 
a half score of ragged, sooty urchins with their cry of 
" Sweep ho!" There is a wide lane flanking the wall 
(hence called Wall Street), and on its inner side is a row 
of rude thatched cabins, the Five Points of New Amster- 
dam, abodes of boatmen, sweeps, tapsters, and social 
outcasts. 

We will walk slowly along the water front, staring at 
everything, as might be expected of curious travelers 
from a far country. Here are queer, half-moon docks 
with no vessels moored to them, but instead placid 
and substantial-looking burghers, talking, smoking, or 
watching fish lines thrown from the dock. Their stores 
and dwellings are across the street, quaint, peaked- 
roofed buildings with crowstep gables, store beneath 
and dwelling above, and, overtopping all, the great stone 
Stadt Huys, or City Hall, with its gallows in front. The 
busiest place of all is the city dock, the first built on 
Manhattan Island, precursor of the thirty miles or m.ore 



56 

of busy wharves of the modern city. The merchants 
call it the " Hooft," and the water in front the " Road- 




City Hall and Great Dock, 1679. 



Stead." There are scows, skiffs, periaguas, and canoes 
moored to it, but no large craft ; they must anchor in 
the Roadstead, being forbidden to come alongside, in 
order to prevent smuggling, and also to keep the sailors 
from roaming through the city. 

A fleet of scows and small boats is employed remov- 
ing cargo to the dock from the ships of all descriptions 
anchored in the Roadstead. These are laden with divers 
articles, according to the port from which they sailed. 
Thus, a " Holland ship," as those from the mother coun- 
try are called, has dry goods, wet goods, hardware, and 
perhaps a few of those "cow calves" and "ewe milk 



57 



sheep " mentioned by the old chroniclers as being staple 
articles of export to New Netherlands during this period. 
One of the scows is 



laden with dried fish 
and English goods 
from a *' snow " just 
arrived from Boston ; 
a second with hogs- 
heads of tobacco from 
a Virginia "ketch;" 
a third with savage, 
unkempt negroesfrom 
the west coast of Af- 
rica, on their way from 
the slaver White Horse, 
to be sold in the slave 
market at public auc- 
tion to the highest 




Leister's House. 



bidder. A galley from Curafao is unloading costly 
dyewoods and tropical fruits into a fourth, while a fifth, 
tied to a " pincke " from Barbados, is receiving barrels 
of sugar and hogsheads of molasses, the latter exud- 
ing sweetness in the hot sun. Molasses smears the deck 
of the scow and now and then causes a fall amono- the 

o 

barefooted slaves that man her. On the other hand, 
this sloop of the great patroon of Rensselaerwyck is 
sending ashore bales of costly furs — mink, otter, beaver, 
wolf, bear, and others. All must be landed at the city 
dock and pay duty ; consequently the latter is a busy 
place, as before remarked. Gangs of Angola slaves 
receive the ^oods, and after they are duly entered 



58 

trundle them off across the street to the merchants' 
warehouses, or to the company's five great stone store- 
houses tliat stand in a row between what will be Bridge 
and Stone streets later. 

The four great merchants of New Amsterdam at 
this period — Cornelis Steenwyck, Pieter Cornelissen 
Vanderveen, Govert Loockermans, and Isaac Allerton 
— are among them in their cloth coats with silver buttons 
and baggy breeches, to see that they get good weight 
and measure, and that the negroes keep to their task and 
practice no thievery; indeed, Cornelis Steenwyck is so 




x^i^'t'' 



-'trnni 







Jg!^*^'^' 



East River near Coenties Slip, 1658. 

careful that he is followed by a negro woman with 
needle and thread, who sews up any rents in bags or 
bales that his sharp eyes detect. 



59 

Turning again to the water front, we find a warning 
placard off the future Coenties Shp forbidding vessels of 
fifty tons or under to anchor between there and the fort 
under a heavy penalty. There is another near the future 
Fulton Street forbidding any vessel at all to moor above 
that point, thus collecting all the craft in the harbor into 
one locality. Quite a fleet there is, too, and such queer 
craft, with their square bows, broad beams, and sterns 
built so high you would think the first gale from astern 
would catch them up and bury them fathoms deep by 
the bows — very different from the craft of grace and 
beauty that later gathered at these wharves. Their 
names are quite as quaint and curious — Flozvei^ of 
Guilder y Sea Mew^ Little Fox, Blue Cock, New Net her - 
lands Fortune, Little Crane, Great CJiristopJier, Nezv 
NetJierland Lndian, and so on. 

We are about to proceed, following the ferry road on 
to the fort, when we notice a stir on the dock, and look- 
ing up, see that the flag on the flagstaff has been hoisted 
to the masthead, which means that a Holland ship is 
standing in. Such an event will be too common for 
notice in later days, but to these good people it means 
tidings from home and kin, of fathers and mothers, 
brothers and sisters, wives and sweethearts ; news of the 
world, also, up to the vessel's sailing eight weeks before, 
and to the merchants news of ventures, fate of argosies. 

So they hasten to the Battery and welcome the new- 
comer with waving of hats and handkerchiefs. By 
and by a gun from the fort brings the vessel to off the 
Battery. The haven master boards her, inspects papers 
and manifests, and she is then allowed to proceed to her 



6o 

anchorage in the Roadstead, and to discliarge her pas 
sengers. 

At Bridge Street is a great bridge over the Heere 
Graft, or Principal Canal, which here enters from the 
East River, and extends along the line of Broad Street 
up to Exchange Place. No doubt the burghers built it 




Canal and Bridge in Broad Street. 

to remind them of Holland. They cherish it highly 
and take the utmost care of it. Its sides are protected 
by wooden piling. No one may throw refuse into it or . 
defile its waters. There are broad sidewalks on either 
side of it, patrolled by a burly "Graft officer," whose 
duty it is to keep the siding in repair, prevent nuisances, 
and " lay the boats, canoes, and other craft that come 
therein in order." 

There are many of the latter within it now — Long 
Island farmers laden w^ith produce, Indians in canoes with 
furs and game to sell. The bridge near its mouth is a 



6i 

famous meeting place for the merchants, the first Mer- 
chants' Exchange ; at its mouth are the company's stores 
before mentioned, and opposite it the Roadstead. 

Let us next turn into Whitehall Street, which will 
lead us to the fort. It is well built up on one side 
with solid stone and brick houses showing checkerwork 




The Fort. 



fronts and crowstep gables, and overlooking the Bat- 
tery and the shining reaches of the bay. It is quite the 
patrician quarter. Here at the foot is Governor Stuy- 
vesant's town mansion, known far and wide as the 
"White Hall," and giving the street its name. Behind 
each house is a garden gay with flowers, the wonderful 
tulip of Holland predominating, and in the rear of this 
an orchard of pear, peach, plum, apple, quince, and 
apricot trees well loaded with young fruit. Primeval 



62 

oaks and elms spared from the ancient forests shade this 
really beautiful thoroughfare. 

It leads us up to the Bowling Green, or " Common," 
the first laid out by the city fathers. Whitehall Street 
enters this from the east, while Broadway leaves it on 
the north. On the south or seaward side stands the 
fort, a quadrangular earthwork having bastions faced 
with stone, and mounting twenty-two curious, wide- 
mouthed brass and bronze cannon. Bombards, serpen- 
tines, culverins, and so on, the soldiers call them, and 
they throw stone as well as iron balls. 

The interior, or parade, is one hundred and fifty feet 
square, and in its center is planted the tall flagstaff 
we saw from the water front ; and there proudly floats 
the white, blue, and orange flag of the West India 
Company. A quaint windmill, its tower turning on a 
pivot, stands on the northwest bastion, whence come the 
prevailing winds. 

The principal object within the fort, however, is the 
great stone church built by Kieft in 1642, with its two 
peaked roofs, and the tower looming aloft between. 
The government house, a plain brick structure, also 
built by Kieft, stands beside it, and with the jail, bar- 
racks, and storehouses of .stone completes the list of 
buildings within the fort. 

There are many soldiers lounging about, while little 
groups of townspeople and sightseers promenade the 
ramparts, for the fort is one of the lions of the infant 
city. 

A little wearied with our sightseeing, we will now 
cross the Green to the tavern of the worshipful Mar- 



6 



-y 



ten Cregier, president of the burgomasters and captain 
of the burgher guard, which tavern is the fashion- 
able inn of the city. Whenever the governors of the 
neighboring colonies, titled visitors from abroad, military 
and naval officers, book-making travelers, and commis- 
sioners sent to treat on vexed questions of boundaries 
or runaway slaves or illicit trade, come to town, they 
are at once referred to the inn of the good burgomaster. 
Scarcely have we drawn rein when the host appears 
to welcome us, and a hostler holds the stirrup while we 
dismount. Crossing the broad, brick-floored stoop, or 
porch, furnished with comfortable wooden benches, we 
pass through the two-leaved oaken door into the wide 
hall, on one side of which is the parlor, with oiled floor 
and ponderous stiff-backed Dutch furniture, and on the 
other the great public room of the inn. The floor of the 
latter has been freshly sprinkled with clean white sand 
brought from Coney Island by the " vlie boats," and 
it has been drawn into whorls and grotesque figures by 
Gretchen's tireless broom. The walls are graced by 
deers' antlers, on which hang the long " goose guns " of 
the landlord and his guests, by placards, and by funny 
Dutch prints of hunting scenes and the like. In one 
corner is a sideboard, rich with decanters, bottles, and 
glasses, and a rack stuck full of long pipes, each inscribed 
with the name of its owner; for the inn is the resort of 
the better class of citizens, the merchants and gentry, 
filling the place of the modern clubhouse and exchange. 
Two very fat merchants are already here, seated at a 
little table, sipping foaming Sopus beer, smoking con- 
tentedly, and now and then venturing a remark. The 



64 

placards give us a vivid idea of the iron rule of Stuyve- 
sant, for most of them are ordinances telling what the 
tapsters and the people may not do. One commands 
the innkeeper not to give or sell any strong drink 
to the Indians ; another commands him to report at 
once to the proper officer any one hurt or wounded in his 
house ; another forbids him to admit or entertain any 
company in the evening after the ringing of the farmers' 
bell, or sell or furnish any liquors on the Sabbath, " trav- 
elers and boarders alone excepted, before three o'clock 
in the afternoon, when divine service is finished." 

Does it not seem strange to read the following pla- 
card? "Whereas we are informed of the crreat rava^res 
the wolf commits on the small cattle, therefore, to ani- 
mate and encourage the proprietors who will go out and 
shoot the same, we have resolved to authorize the assist- 
ant sellout [sheriff] and schepens to give public notice 
that whoever shall exhibit a wolf to them which hath 
been shot on this island on this side Harlem shall be 
promptly paid therefor by them, for a wolf fl. 20, and 
for a she- wolf fl. 30, in wampum or the value thereof." 
The thickets that cover the greater portion of the 
island are favorite retreats for these and other wild 
beasts. 

After a substantial Dutch supper of wild fowl and 
game, we sit with the other guests on the stoop, where 
Phyllis, the barmaid, brings us spiced sangaree and pipes. 
The sun is sinking behind the noble forest that still lines 
Broadway on the west, and the people seek their stoops 
to enjoy the evening hour. Nearly all these have their 
burden of beautiful women and staid, taciturn men, the 



65 

former chatting among themselves or with acquaint- 
ances, who, stroUing by, stop for neighborly gossip. 
As stranq-ers we are interested in the scene that 




A Tea Party. 



gradually unfolds before us. Carriages filled with ladies 
and gentlemen roll by, and among them the governor's 
state coach, with the ladies of his family bowing and 



TODD, N. Y. — 5 



66 

smiling. From the fort comes the measured tread of 
the sentinel. Lovers stroll by arm in arm on their way 
to the Bowling Green, the maidens of a beauty so 
marked that English travelers will note the fact in their 
books. 

Nor are the common people wanting. There are 
laborers and artisans in toil-stained frocks and leather 
breeches, bare-armed servant girls in homespun waists 
and short gowns, turbaned negresses bringing " tea 
water" from the pump. Soon Gabriel Carpesey, the 
town herdsman, appears driving in the flocks for the 
evening milking from the common lands (at the present 
City Hall Park), where he drove them to pasture in the 
morning. At every gate he stops and blows his horn 
to tell the householder that his cow has come home. 

By and by a little stir up the street attracts our atten- 
tion, and looking up, there comes in view a hunting party 
of Indians, each warrior placing his foot in the footprint of 
the one preceding him, and gazing neither left nor right. 
They bear to market haunches of venison, wild tur- 
keys, and the quarters of an elk. What a motley array ! 
For instance, one sports a doublet of bearskin, another 
is clad in a blanket only, a third stalks along in a coat 
of raccoon skins, while a fourth is clad in a mantle made 
of the brilliant-hued feathers of the wild turkey. 

The sight leads a stout burgher at our side to say: 
" Never was a people better fed. The woods swarm 
with game, — elk, deer, bear, hare, turkeys, partridges, 
quail, — and the waters with ducks, geese, and swans. 
An Indian will sell a buck for five guilders. The wor- 
shipful patroon De Vries once shot a wild turkey that 



67 

weighed thirty pounds. Hendrik de Backer killed once 
eleven wild geese at one shot of his big goose gun. As 
to fish, we have sturgeon, salmon, bass, drum, shad, cod, 
smelts, sheepshead, herring, mackerel, blackflsh, lobster, 
weakfish, oysters, clams, and scallops." 

Scarcely have the Indians passed when a bell in the 
fort tolls heavily, — one, two, three, up to nine, — and 
with its last note the city gates close with a clang. It 
is the curfew bell — the " farmers' bell," the people call 
it, perhaps because after it egress to the farms without 
is shut off by the closing of the gates. 

As its last melodious notes sink into the evening air, 
the lights in stores and houses fade, the streets cease to 
echo with footsteps, and New Amsterdam sinks into 
slumber. 

At the first stroke of the bell comely Gretchen comes 
to show us to our chamber. It is a large, square room 
overhead, with a half-dozen bunks or berths set into the 
partition wall, and closed by a sort of trapdoor that lets 
down on hinges. She puts the tallow candle on the 
mantel and departs. We prepare for rest and then 
inspect our quarters. There are two feather beds in 
each bunk, a large and a small one. We jump in and 
pull the smaller one over us for a cover. By and by 
Gretchen returns, closes the trapdoor, and removes the 
candle, leaving us to sleep peacefully in our box. Next 
morning we rise early and go for a stroll on the Green. 
It is much larger than the Green of the modern city, 
with finer shade, and as we enter it we meet scores of 
little black boys, turbaned Phyllises, and stout peasant 
maids rosy of cheek, bareheaded and bare-armed. 



. 6Z 

bringing water from the town pump over there against 
the fort wall. 

As it happens, next day is Sunday, and, with all 




A Wedding in New Amsterdam. 

respectable New Amsterdam, we go to church, hoping to 
see more of the people and their ways. The church is 
in the fort, and we are there at the first stroke of the 



69 

bell, being rewarded therefor by seeing the worship- 
ers pass in review before us. There are two great 
columns that converge at the fort gate, one coming 
down Broadway, the other up Whitehall Street and the 
ferry road, while the Green rapidly fills with the wagons 
and carts of the country people who have come from 
the bouweries in the upper part of the island and on 
the Long Island shore. 

They make a gallant show, this company of church- 
goers, for great attention is paid to dress, at least by 
gentlemen, and the wealth}^ Englishmen and French 
Huguenots who have settled in New Amsterdam during 
the past twenty years have introduced rich and splendid 
costumes. 

The ladies wear on their heads colored hoods of silk 
or taffeta instead of bonnets ; their hair is curled and 
frizzled, and sprinkled with powder; on their fingers are 
gold and diamond rings, golden lockets on their bosoms, 
and attached to their girdles by fine gold chains are 
their Bibles and psalm books, richly bound in gold and 
silver. From beneath their quilted petticoats their feet, 
in low shoes and colored hose, *' like little mice steal in 
and out." The petticoat is the most important article 
of feminine attire at this period. The rich gown is cut 
away in front to display it; in material it may be of 
cloth, silk, satin, camlet, or grosgrain, and of colors to 
please the fancy of the wearer, red, blue, black, white, 
and purple predominating. 

The gentlemen display the latest London or Amster- 
dam fashions. Their heads are covered with powdered, 
full-bottomed wigs, and the wide brims of their soft hats 



70 

are looped up on the sides with rosettes. Their long 
coats have two rows of silver buttons in front, and the 
wide pockets are trimmed with silver lace ; the mate- 
rial is colored stuff and black velvet and broadcloth. 
Their waistcoats, or doublets, are of bright-colored cloth 
or velvet, and embroidered with silver lace. Their 
breeches, generally of velvet, end at the knee in black 
silk stockings, and they wear on their feet low shoes 
adorned with large silver buckles. These are the gen- 
try, of course, but the commonalty are well represented 
— honest Hans in loose blouse and baggy breeches of 
homespun, Katrina in linsey-woolsey gown and petti- 
coat, with deep poke bonnet on her head. 

The worshipers have nearly all entered when the 
carriage of Governor Stuyvesant, with its blazoned 
panels, dashes up, and the governor and his family 
alight — the governor, his wife, and his widowed sister, 
Mrs. Bayard. The former bears himself like a soldier 
in spite of the wooden leg, bound with bands of silver, 
which replaces the one lost in honorable fight with the 
Spanish at Saint Martin. Mrs. Stuyvesant, a beautiful 
French lady, daughter of a Huguenot clergyman of 
Paris, is famed for her beauty and her elegant toilets. 

Let us follow I his stately party into the church. It 
is a plain, bare interior, with a very high pulpit, and 
over it a sounding board like a bird with wings out- 
spread. 

Scarcelv are we seated ere the burc^omasters and 
schc]3ens in their black official robes enter from the ves- 
try, preceded by the " koeck," or bell ringer, bearing 
the cushion for the official pew, and followed by good 



71 

Domine Megapolensis, also in black robes. At the foot 
of the pulpit stairs he pauses and utters a silent prayer, 
while the people bow their heads. As he takes his seat 
in the pulpit, the zeikentrooster, or lay reader, rises 
and reads the morning lesson. 

The orderly and decorous service proceeds. When 
the sands have all run out of the hourglass before him, 
the zeikentrooster announces the fact by three taps of 
his cane, and the domine brings his sermon to a close. 
Then the koeck inserts the public notices to be read in 
the end of his wand of office, and hands them up to the 
preacher. This being done, the elders rise in their pews, 
while the minister delivers a homily on the duty of 
remembering the poor, after which the elders pass 
through the church, and receive in a little black bag 
fastened to a long pole the alms of the worshipers. 

Service over, the people proceed to their homes, 
and the poor schout-fiscal is relieved of his task of 
patrolling the streets, seeing that no taprooms are open, 
and no Indians or negro slaves gaming; for although 
Sunday afternoon is a holiday for the latter, an ordinance 
sternly forbids their playing or gaming ** during the 
hours of morning service." 

With the afternoon before us, we can follow one of the 
wagons which has come down from the Walloon village 
on the Brooklyn shore. 

The wagon with the farmer and his stout, rosy- 
cheeked vrouw passes out the water gate by which we 
entered, and so along the woodsy road to the ferry house. 
The latter is merely an open shed roofed with thatch 
a,n6, extending into the water, so that the flatboat and 



72 



two or three skiffs that comprise the ferry fleet may be 
moored to it. CorneHs Dircksen and his stroncr-armed 
lads are at hand, since it is Sunday ; had it been a week 
day we should have to take the long horn that hangs on 








«y.ii:|imirr|ir)i|1|7j,]x -., 







H^rSll^te^^^^eb 



^...^-;-*'.: 














'-^- ^:-0^^ 



Ferry to Brooklyn. 



yonder tree and blow a blast as loud as Roderick Dhu's 
in order to summon them from their work in the fields. 
The ferry ordinances are posted in the house, together 
with the tariff of fares — a two-horse wagon or cart 
with the horses, 2 florins ^ lO stivers ; a one-horse wagon, 
2 florins ; for every man, woman, Indian, or squaw, 6 
stivers, but if there are more than one in the party 3 
stivers each ; children under ten years of age half fare; 
one horse or horned beast, i florin 10 stivers ; a hogshead 
of tobacco 16 stivers, a tun of beer the same, and smaller 
articles in proportion. One rule stipulates that the 
ferryman shall be bound to ferry over passengers from 

1 A florin is forty cents American money, a stiver one cent. 



71> 

five in the morning until eight at night, '* provided the 
windmill hath not taken in its sail." 

The tide is ebbing swiftly toward Governors Island, 
and as the wind blows stiffly against it there is an ugly 
sea. Consequently the unwieldy boat is borne steadily 
toward the island, dancing and bobbing on the choppy 
waves, and we begin to fear that we shall be wrecked 
on its rocky shores, when the men succeed in getting 
her into the slack water on the Brooklyn side. Then 
comes the long pull up to the ferry landing at the foot 
of the later Fulton Street. We sympathize with Cor- 
nells when he mops his heated brow and remarks that 
it is " a long pull and little money." The boat has been 
an hour in crossing. 

There is a ferry house here also, a tavern, and a few 
small dwellings of laborers and workmen. The road 
runs diagonally up the Heights and on, passing scarcely 
a house on the way, until it reaches Flatbush, some five 
miles distant, where there is a considerable settlement. 
At the Wallabout (later the Navy Yard) the Walloons 
have a pretty village ; but the modern patrician quarter, 
the Heights, is crowned with nature's temple, the prime- 
val forest, as is almost the entire site of the modern city. 

After a pleasant visit we return from Brooklyn and 
ride out by the Broad Way, or " land gate." The 
famous thoroughfare was first laid out as a cow path 
from the fort to the common pasture lands. Now it 
is lined with residences as far as the gate, and above 
that winds as a country road as far as the site of the 
modern City Hall, where it ends in primeval forest. 
The Dutch first called it Heere Straat (Principal Street), 



74 

later Breede Wig, which the Enghsh translated Broad- 
way. Just without the gate is the West India Com- 
pany's garden, afterwards the site of Trinity church- 
yard. Next above is the farm of Jan Jansen Damen, 
and next to that the company's farm, which later will be 
confiscated b\' the English, who will call it the " King's 
Farm " and grant it to Trinity Church. This farm lies 
between the modern Fulton and Chambers streets. 
Above this lies a rough tract of sixty-two acres, owned 
by Annetje Jans, the widow of Domine Bogardus. It 
will be sold in 1670 by a part of her heirs to Governor 
Lovelace, and he not being able to pay for it, it will be 
seized by his successor. Governor Andros, and known as 
the " Duke's Farm," and later granted to Trinity Church 
by Queen. Anne. 

At this time (1664) New Amsterdam contains two 
hundred and twenty houses and fourteen hundred 
people. 



VII. THE ENGLISH COLONIAL PERIOD. 

WE return now to take up the thread of later his- 
tory. Henceforth for one hundred and eleven 
years, except for a brief period, New York was to remain 
a British colony. It must be admitted that the change 
was a beneficial one. Instead of a mere trading post, 
governed by a commercial monopoly and surrounded 
by hostile colonies, she now became one of several prov- 
inces under the same government, speaking the same 
tongue, and having the same general interests. She did 
not achi^eve full liberty, but she had more liberty. In 
treating of this period we shall have space for only the 
more important events, and shall give due prominence 
to the one great principle which underlay the rest — the 
struggle of the people for their rights, and especially for 
the right to govern themselves. 

Twenty royal governors ruled New York during this 
period, under eight kings and queens — Charles II. and 
James II. of the Stuart line, WilHam and Mary of the 
house of Orange, Queen Anne of the Stuart line again, 
and lastly the Georges I., II., and III. of the Brunswick 
line.^ As a rule the royal governors were not noted for 

1 The names of these governors, with their terms of office, were: 
Richard Nicolls, 1664-1668; Francis Lovelace, 1668-1673; Sir Edmund 
Andros, 1674-1682; Thomas Dongan, 1683-1689; Henry Sloughter, 

75 



^6 

patriotism or statesmanship. A few were men o( 
sagacity and experience in public affairs, who were ap- 
pointed because of their fitness. Colonel Nicolls, the 
first, was one of the most capable. Certain problems and 
difficulties confronted him that were not met with by 
his successors. A conquered people was to be placated, 
new conditions were to be established, special laws pro- 
vided. Nicolls performed the task with tact and discre- 
tion. The Dutch were secured in their homes, business, 
and religion, and for nearly a year were left in posses- 
sion of their city government. Then, when their fear 
and suspicion of the English had been greatly allayed, 
the latter was changed to the English form ; schout, 
burgomasters, and schepens giving place to mayor, 
aldermen, and councilors. 

A code of laws was framed called the ** Duke's Laws," 
more liberal in many respects than those of the Dutch. 
Trial by jury was established, a court of sessions also 
for the city, and a justice court for each town, with the 
right of appeal to the higher court. Treason, murder, 
kidnaping, striking parents, denying the true God, 
and some other crimes were punishable by death. Slav- 
ery was permitted, but no Christians were to be enslaved 

1691 (died July 23, i6gi); Benjamin Fletcher, 1692-1698; Earl of 
IJelloniont, 1698 (died March 5, 1701); Lord Cornbury, 1702-1708; 
Lord Lovelace, 1708 (died May 6, 1709); Robert Hunter, 1710-1719; 
William Burnet, 1720-1728; Lord John Montgomery, 1728 (died July 
I, 1731); William Cosby, 1732 (died March 10, 1736); George Clinton, 
1743-1753; Sir Danvers Osborne, 1753 (died October 12, 1753); Sir 
Charles ILardy, 1755-1757; Robert Monckton, 1761-1765; Sir Henry 
Moore, 1 765-1 770; Earl of Dunmore, 1770; Sir William Tryon, 1771 
(deposed in the Revolution). The interregnums between some of these 
dates were filled by lieutenant governors or provisional governors. 



77 

except criminals sentenced by lawful authority. In 
order to trade with the Indians merchants must procure 
a license. No Indian was allowed to powwow, or per- 
form incantations to the devil. No sect was to be favored 
above another, and no Christian was to be molested for 
his religious opinions. The patents of the great patroons 
were confirmed to them under the English titles of 
** manors." The Dutch were secured in their ownership 
of the great stone church in the fort, and worshiped 
there in the morning, yielding it to the English congre- 
gation in the afternoon. 

During the war of England against the Netherlands 
and France (1665- 1667), New York was in constant 
apprehension of an attack from the Dutch fleet, but es- 
caped for the time. In the second war of England against 
the Netherlands (1672- 1674), in which the former had 
France for an ally. New York was not so fortunate. 
In the spring of 1673 the Dutch dispatched a squadron 
under command of two brave admirals, Evertsen and 
Binckes, to recover their lost territory in America, and 
to inflict as much damage as possible on English com- 
merce in those seas. 

On the 29th of June the sentinel on Fort James (as 
Fort Amsterdam had been named) saw this fleet enter 
and cast anchor in the lower bay, with some twenty 
English prizes in tow. 

Governor Lovelace, who had succeeded Nicolls in 
1668, was in Hartford consulting with Governor Win- 
throp of Connecticut concerning the defense of the two 
colonies, and a messenger was at once sent posthaste for 
him, while Captain Manning, in command of Fort James, 



78 

charged his guns, and sent his drummers out to beat the 
alarm. The Dutch admirals, however, were as sensible 
of the value of time as Nicolls had been in 1664. They 
forthwith moved their fleet to within a musket shot of 
the fort, and sent Manning a laconic summons to sur- 
render. ** We have come for our own," they added 
grimly, '* and -our own we will have." Manning sought 
to gain time by asking for terms, but Evertsen replied 
that he had already promised protection to life and 
property, and that if the Dutch flag was not hoisted over 
the fort in half an hour he should fire on it; " and the 
glass is already turned up," he added significantly. 

But Manning refused to surrender, and when the half 
hour had expired the fleet fired a broadside into the fort, 
killing several and wounding more. At the same time 
a detachment of six hundred Dutch landed at a point 
behind the present Trinity Church, and assailed the 
garrison in the rear. Manning, finding the odds too 
great, surrendered, and was allowed to march out with 
the honors of w^ar, drums beating and colors flying; 
while the dragon flag fluttered down from the fort, and 
the blue, white, and orange was again triumphantly 
raised over it. A second time the fort was renamed, 
this time William Hendrik, and the province called New 
Orange, both after William, Prince of Orange, the pride 
and hope of the Dutch state. 

But the city did not long remain in possession of the 
Dutch, for in the treaty of Westminster (1674) they 
relinquished forever all claims to their former territory 
of New Netherlands. Lovelace did not return as gov- 
ernor, however. Sir Edmund Andros, a member of King 



. 79 

Charles's household and bailiff of Guernsey, having been 
appointed in his place. The principal event of Andros's 
reign was the granting to New York by James of a 
provincial assembly. 

The people quickly found that, although their condi- 
tion was more tolerable than under Stuyvesant, they 
were still ruled by one man, the Duke of York, three 
thousand miles away. They desired a voice in the man- 
agement of their own affairs, as had the colonies to the 
east and south of them ; and in the summer of 1681 they 
sent to the duke a petition signed by many thousand 
citizens, praying that he would henceforth govern them 
by means of a council, assembly, and governor, as was 
done by the king in his colonies. 

James carefully considered the matter, and on being 
advised that in order to collect a revenue it would be 
necessary to give the province an assembly, granted the 
prayer of the petitioners. But as Andros by his haughty 
manner and tyrannical acts had become obnoxious to 
the people, he decided to recall him and appoint Thomas 
Dongan, a tried soldier, who as lieutenant governor of 
Tangier in Africa had had experience in governing. 
Dongan reached the city in August, 1683, and one of 
his first official acts was to issue writs for deputies to the 
first Provincial Assembly of New York, who were to be 
elected by the people. 

From these ancient writs we learn that New York's 
bounds then extended east as far as the Connecticut 
River, and included the islands of Nantucket, Marthas 
Vineyard, and Long Island. The districts that returned 
deputies to this first assembly were New York, Albany, 



8o 

Rensselaerwyck, Esopiis on the Hudson, Long Island, 
Staten Island, Pemaquid, and Marthas Vineyard, the 
whole number of members being eighteen, most of them 
Dutch in nationality.' This first assembly of New York 
convened on October i 7, 1683, with Matthias Nicolls as 
speaker, and sat for three weeks. Its first act was to 
accept a " Charter of Liberties and Privileges," which 
had been granted by the duke. This instrument pro- 
vided for self-government, self-taxation, and freedom of 
conscience, three principles which the people had long 
been striving for. Another act levied a duty on goods 
imported. A third created four courts of justice — a town 
court, a county court, a general court of oyer and ter- 
miner, and a supreme court, the latter composed of the 
governor and council ; even from the latter court an 
appeal might be had to the king. This assembly also 
passed a naturalization act by which all residents of the 
colony except slaves might become citizens by profess- 
ing Christianity and taking the oath of allegiance to 
the king. 

But before King Charles could sign this charter, and 
thereby make it a law, he died (February 6, 1685), and 
James ascended the throne. Now that their patron and 
proprietor was on the throne the people looked for even 
greater favors ; but alas ! they soon found that James the 
king was a very different person from James the duke. 
As king he discovered that the Charter of Liberties and 
Privileges w^as too liberal, and refused to confirm it, 
although he allowed the colonists to enjoy its provisions 
during his pleasure. However, this made very little differ- 
ence, for in November, 1688, the Dutch prince, William 



8i 

of Orange, who had married James's daughter ]\Iary, 
landed in England and raised the standard of revolt, 
whereupon James abdicated in favor of his son-in-law 
and daughter. You can learn all about the causes of 
this revolt, which makes an interesting story, in your 
Macaulay or Green. 

Before his abdication, however, James had matured a 
plot against his American colonies in the north that was 
intended to deprive them of their long-cherished liber- 
ties. He issued a decree in the spring of 1688 uniting 
all the colonies north of the fortieth parallel in one great 
province, to be called New England. It included New 
Jersey, New York, and the New England colonies, Penn- 
sylvania being excepted. Sir Edmund Andros, whom 
the colonists already disliked, was named governor of 
the united province, with headquarters at Boston, and 
arrived in New York in August, 1688, to receive the 
submission of the people. He came in state, accom- 
panied by a large and imposing retinue. The City Guard, 
a regiment of foot and a troop of horse, in shining regi- 
mentals,' received him and escorted him to Fort James, 
where his commission was read to the assembled people ; 
later it w^as read in the City Hall to a more select audi- 
ence. The seal of New York was brought into the gov- 
ernor's presence, and broken and defaced by order of 
the king, and the great seal of New England was 
adopted in its place. 

These things related more to the province, however, 
than to the city. One thing James did for the latter 
during his brief reign for which w^e should hold him in 
grateful remembrance : he gave her the Great Charter, 

TODD, N. v.— 6 



82 

on which, as on a firm foundation, the subsequent char- 
ters of 1708 and 1730 were based. This instrument 
confirmed all previous " rights and privileges" granted 
the city, and gave it in addition the City Hall, the great 
dock and bridge (probably the bridge over the canal 
in Broad Street), the two market houses, the ferry, 
and the vacant, unpatented shore lands above low-water 
mark. Most of these vested rights we still enjoy, and 
they are yielding the city large revenues to-day, mostly 
in docks and ferries. 

The people of New England especially were very 
much incensed against King James for thus depriving 
them of their chartered rights, as well as against Andros, 
his agent, and the moment that news of the former's 
abdication reached Boston her citizens seized Andros 
and thrust him into prison. 



VIII. THE ENGLISH COLONIAL PERIOD 
{CofiUunec/)—LElSLER'S REVOLT. 

A CHAOTIC condition of affairs arose in New York 
as the result of the abdication of James and the 
imprisonment of Andros. Two factions at once ap- 
peared, composed, as to race, of the EngHsh against the 
Dutch ; as to class, of the aristocrats against the com- 
moners ; as to religion, of the Church of England against 
the Dutch Reformed Church. 

The strife was as to who should rule the city. The 
English held that the officers appointed by James then 
in power should stand until their successors should be 
appointed by William and Mary, in which position they 
had law and precedent on their side. The Dutch party 
held that with the flight of James his authority ceased 
in the colonies as much as in England, and that there- 
fore the people under their charter should appoint offi- 
cers to rule until the pleasure of William should be 
known. Lieutenant Governor Nicholson and the three 
members of Governor Andros's council, Frederick 
Phillipse, Mayor Stephanus Van Cortlandt, and Nicholas 
Bayard, were the leaders of the English party. Phillipse 
was lord of the manor of Phillipseborough ; his old 
manor house you may still see in the heart of the city 

83 



84 



of Yonkers, in use as the city hall. Van Cortlandt was 
mayor, and had been judge of the admiralty. Bayard 




Phillipse Manor House (now City Hall), 
Yonkers. 

was a connection of Stuyvesant, 

had been mayor of the city, -^•'---~~"' 

and was now colonel of the regiment of city militia. 

The leaders of the democratic party were Jacob 
Leisler and Jacob Millborne. Leisler was German 
born, but had lived in New York some thirty years. 
He was a prosperous merchant, a deacon in the Dutch 
Reformed Church, captain of one of the six train bands 
which made up Colonel Bayard's regiment of militia, a 
man of much energy and force of character, but unedu- 
cated, self-willed, passionate, and unbalanced in judg- 
ment ; a fanatic on the subject of popery, a stern hater 
of the English, their church, and their institutions. 
Millborne was Leisler's son-in-law, a man of better edu- 
cation, but of far less principle. 

The struggle for power began on April 29, 1689, by 
Leisler's refusing to pay the duties on a cargo of wine 



85 

he had Imported, " because," he said, " Collector 
Ploughman was a papist, and therefore not qualified to 
perform his duties under the Protestant sovereigns 
William and Mary." 

A long discussion in the Cit}^ Hall between the coun- 
cil and Leisler was ended by the latter's declaring that 
he would never pay a penny to Ploughman. And now 
strange rumors began to be whispered about the town 
by the ignorant burghers. It was said that Lieutenant 
Governor Nicholson was plotting to betray the city to 
the French. His papist emissaries filled the woods on 
Staten Island, and met him nightly in consultation. 
King James, who had fled to France, w^as on the seas 
with a French fleet, to whom Nicholson would deliver 
up the city. The chief Dutch citizens had" already been 
won over to poperv. Ex- Governor Dongan, who still 
lingered in New York, had formed a plot to murder the 
Protestants and yield the city to the Catholics. These 
,and many other disquieting rumors flew about. This 
fear and unrest of the public mind must be considered 
in order to understand what followed. 

A very little thing at last brought on the conflict. 
Nicholson resided in the governor's house in the fort, 
and coming in late one night found a member of the 
militia company which had been detailed to guard the 
fort standing sentinel at the gate. This was contrary 
to regulations, and calling the sergeant in command, he 
reprimanded him. The latter replied that Lieutenant 
Cuyler had ordered it, and that officer in turn laid 
the blame on his superior officer, Captain de Peyster. 
Nicholson, who distrusted the militia, fell into a passion 



86 

at this, and said he would rather see the town in flames 
than be spied upon and overruled by his militia cap- 
tains. This was at once tortured into a threat to burn 
the city, and soon the rumor flew about that the gov- 
ernor had formed a plot to fire the city and murder all 
the Dutch citizens the next Sunday as they came to 
church in the fort. The six train bands which formed 
the city militia were nearly all Dutch, and, led by Leisler, 
they now determined, in order to save their lives and 
property, to seize the fort and government. 

The Sunday came, — May 31, 1689, — and at noon a 
single drumbeat was heard. Captain Leisler's com- 
pany at once mustered before his house, and was led 
by Sergeant Stoll to the fort, where Lieutenant Cuyler, 
who was in charge, admitted them. In a few moments 
Leisler appeared and took command. On hearing of 
this, Colonel Bayard, commander of the militia, went to 
the fort and ordered the soldiers to disperse; but Stoll 
coolly told him that they disowned all authority of the 
Andros government. Having no force to defend him- 
self. Lieutenant Governor Nicholson made no resistance, 
and shortly after sailed for England to lay the matter 
before King William, leaving affairs in the hands of his 
three councilors. 

Leisler, by virtue of his command over the City Guard, 
now ruled as governor of the city. His first act was to 
write an address to William and Mary in behalf of " the 
militia and inhabitants of New York," describing the 
revolution and its causes, and pledging to them the loyal 
support of himself and those acting with him. At first 
he governed with justice and moderation, but he seems 



^7 

soon to have become intoxicated with the possession of 
unHmited power, and treated those opposed to him with 
great arrogance and even cruelty. About the middle 
of June two envoys came from Hartford bearing orders 
to proclaim William and Mary in New York, as they had 
shortly before been proclaimed in Boston and Hartford. 
The envoys also bore a royal proclamation confirming all 
Protestant officers in the colonies in their places. This 
was fatal to the claims of Leisler and his party, and 
spurred them on to the rash and fatal extremity of 
resistance. Mayor Van Cortlandt rode far up into 
Westchester to intercept the envoys, but Leisler man- 
aged to secure both proclamations from them, and read 
the first named in the fort on the 22d, although Mayor 
Van Cortlandt demanded that they should be delivered 
to him as the lawful authority. Two days later the 
mayor succeeded in securing a copy of the second proc- 
lamation, which constituted himself and his colleagues, 
Phillipse and Bayard, the only legal government, since 
they were Protestants and had received their commis- 
sions from the crown. The three met with the common 
council to consult on the best plan of regaining their 
authority without provoking civil war. Their first act 
was to remove the collector of the port, who was a 
Catholic, and therefore ineligible, and to appoint in his 
place four commissioners, all Protestants, to perform his 
duties. Scarcely had they begun, however, when Leis- 
ler, at the head of a body of militia, marched in and 
peremptorily ordered them out of the room. Bayard 
sternly reminded him that they were there by order of 
the kin^, and that resistance to them would be high 



88 

treason, and punishable with death. Leisler in reply 
began a long speech in which the words ** rogues," *' trai- 
tors," and '* devils " were freely applied to the commis- 
sioners. Even while he was speaking one of his soldiers 
seized a commissioner and dra^s^ed him into the street, 
where he was sadly beaten by the mob. J^ayard him- 
self was attacked, but succeeded in beating off his assail- 
ants and escaping to a house near by, which was at once 
besieged by the mob ; he, however, contrived to elude 
them and regain his own house. Then the rabble pa- 
raded the streets, hooting and shouting for the blood of 
the aristocrats. Their slogan was, •' The rogues have 
sixty men sworn to kill Captain Leisler." Bayard's 
friends came to him next morning, told him what pas- 
sions were moving the commonalty, and besought him 
to flee from the city; he was at length persuaded, and 
succeeded in escaping to Albany. Van Cortlandt re- 
mained, and continued to act as mayor until the next 
October, when his house was attacked, and he was forced 
to flee for safety to Governor Treat of Connecticut. 

Leisler was now sole master of the city, and with his 
lieutenant and ally, Millborne, committed many more 
acts of violence and oppression ; but at last retribution 
came. As soon as King William's ministers turned their 
attention to New York's affairs, they wrote a letter to 
Lieutenant Governor Nicholson, ordering him to as- 
sume the government, call the leading citizens to his 
assistance, and " do and perform all the requirements of 
the office," they supposing him at the time to be in New 
York, whereas he was, as we have seen, on the sea. 
By some fatality this letter was not addressed to him by 



89 

name, but simply to " Our Lieutenant Governor and 
Commander in Chief of our Province of New York in 
America, and in his absence to such as, for the time 
being, take care for preserving the peace and adminis- 
tering the laws in our said Province of New York in 
America." Leisler refused to allow the council to re- 
ceive this letter. The king, he said, knew that he 
was at the head of the government, and intended the 
letter for him. 

The council protested, but Leisler had the men at 
arms and the guns, and the messenger delivered the 
packet to him, whereupon he turned upon the council- 
ors, called them popishly affected dogs and rogues, and 
bade them begone ; he then proclaimed that the king had 
appointed him lieutenant governor, and at once entered 
on the duties of the office, named a council and other 
officers, had William and Mary proclaimed a second 
time, and on the Sabbath rode to the Dutch church and 
sat in the governor's pew, while his councilors seated 
themselves in the pew reserved for the magistrates. 

Meantime Lieutenant Governor Nicholson had reached 
London and laid his case before the king and the com- 
mittee on plantations, who sustained him in all that he had 
done ; but as he had been embroiled in the factional fights 
there, they did not name him governor of New York, 
but made him lieutenant governor of Virginia. Colonel 
Henry Sloughter was appointed governor of New York, 
but owing to the Irish troubles and other causes did not 
reach his government until nearly a year had elapsed. 
Leisler, having secured the chief authority, was placated 
to a certain extent^ so that Van Cortlandt, Colonel Bay- 



90 

ard, and other exiles ventured to return to their famiHes ; 
but they were not long left in peace. 

In the winter of 1690, ha\ing reason to suspect that 
these gentlemen had sent letters of complaint to the 
king, Leisler seized the Boston post rider as he rode 
through Westchester, confiscated his mail bag, and 
found among its contents, as he had expected, letters 
from Van Cortlandt, Bayard, and others complaining 
bitterly of his acts. He at once proclaimed that he had 
discovered a "hellish conspiracy" against his govern- 
ment, and that Colonel Bayard was the instigator of it. 
He therefore sent a file of soldiers, w^ho seized that unfor- 
tunate gentleman, loaded him with chains, and thrust 
him into the common jail, where he received the same 
treatment as was meted out to the worst malefactors. 
Another file was sent against Van Cortlandt, who 
escaped, but William Nicolls, attorney-general of the 
province, was seized and thrust into the same prison 
with Colonel Bayard. They languished in jail many 
months. 

By the summer of 1690 complaints, petitions, and 
addresses from the people of New York began to rain in 
upon King William, beseeching him to deliver them 
from the oppressor. These came not only from the Eng- 
lish, but from the Dutch residents of New York. One 
was signed by the Dutch and French clergymen as well 
as by leading citizens. William, aroused by them, told 
Governor Sloughter that he must proceed to New York 
at once, and bring peace and order to the distracted 
city. Sloughter complied, and in December, 1690, 
sailed in the frigate Archangel, while Major Richard. 



91 

Ingoldsby, the lieutenant governor, followed in the 
Beaver ; two smaller vessels accompanied them. With 
Governor Sloughter sailed two companies of soldiers, and 
all the petitions, complaints, and documents in the case 
of Leisler were given him, with orders to make a careful 
and impartial investigation of the whole matter. 

Sloughter also bore a system of government for the 
province, which differed little from that of James, and 
continued in force to the Revolution. It provided for a 
governor and council to be appointed by the king, and 
an assembly to be elected by the people. All peaceable 
persons ** except papists " were assured liberty of con- 
science, but the Church of England was made the state 
church and placed under the jurisdiction of the Bishop 
of London. The members of the old King James 
council were nearly all retained and confirmed in their 
offices. 

News of the sailing of the fleet came to New York by 
way of Boston, and its arrival was anxiously awaited by 
all parties. At last, on January 29, 1691, a sail was 
sighted far down the Narrows, then a second and third, 
and it was known that the long-expected fleet had 
arrived ; but the fourth sail did not appear, and this 
laggard, most unfortunately for all parties, was the 
AreJiaiigel, the vessel that bore the governor and all 
the papers and commissions. Scarcely had the Beaver 
anchored and saluted the fort ere she was boarded by 
Phillipse and other members of the Nicholson govern- 
ment, who inquired eagerly for the governor. 

" I know not where he is," said Ingoldsby ; " we were 
separated these many days back by a great storm, and 



92 

where the Archangel is, or whether she be at the bot- 
tom of the sea, no man may tell." 

This was a great disappointment ; yet they tried to 
induce the lieutenant governor to act. Rapidly they 
sketched the condition of affairs in the city, — the suffer- 
ings of the poor prisoners, the discontent of the people 
under Leisler's harsh government, the latter's high- 
handed acts of treason and violence, — and urged In- 
goldsby to make a demand at once for the fort and gov- 
ernment. The latter consented, and sent a messenger 
to Leisler demanding the fort for the king's soldiers and 
stores. 

''Your authority?" replied Leisler. 

*' My ships and my soldiers," was the quick response. 

But Leisler would not yield ; he must see the lieuten- 
ant governor's commission from the king; but this was 
in the Archangel with Sloughter, as Leisler w^ell knew. 
Uncertain how to act, Ingoldsby remained cooped up in 
his ships for several days, afraid to land, since Leisler 
had the fort and the troops ; but at length, on being 
assured that the people were with him, he disembarked 
his soldiers and took post in the City Hall, which Leis- 
ler had offered for that purpose. When safely installed 
there he sent a letter to Leisler ordering him to release 
Bayard and Nicolls (still confined in the fort), because 
they had been named as members of his Majesty's 
council; but this threw Leisler into a terrible rage. 

*'What! those popish dogs and rogues?" he cried, 
and returned word that he should hold them until his 
Majesty's further orders arrived. 

Six weeks now passed, this condition of things being 



93 

maintained, the king's lieutenant governor in the City 
Hall, his authority defied, and the king's councilors in 
the common jail. 

At length Leisler committed an overt act of treason 
and murder. Learning that Ingoldsby and the coun- 
cilors had gathered a force of several hundred men in 
the city, he sent them word to disperse under pain of 
being attacked and destroyed. Two hours to consider 
were given ; but the governor replied at once. He 
should preserve the peace, he said, and whoever should 
attack him would render themselves public enemies to 
the crown of England. 

At the time the message was sent Ingoldsby's two 
companies were drawn up on the " Parade," probably 
the Bowling Green, and Leisler, on receiving the reply, 
ordered a gun to be trained on them at once and fired ; 
several shots were also sent into a house where the 
soldiers lodged. When the smoke cleared away it was 
seen that two British soldiers had been killed by the fire 
and several wounded. The English fired at the fort in 
return, but injured no one. 

Happily, next day, as the parties stood confronting 
each other, the ArcJiangel was signaled in the lower 
bay. Word was quickly sent to Governor Sloughter, 
who hurried to the city in a pinnace, and went to the 
City Hall, where his commission was immediately read, 
although it was dark when he arrived. Both the gov- 
ernor and council, except the two imprisoned in the 
fort, then took the oath of office. 

It was eleven o'clock at night, but Ingoldsby was at 
once sent with his soldiers to the fort to demand its sur- 



94 

render in the name of tlie king. But Leisler would not 
comply until he had sent Sergeant Stoll, who had met 
the governor in England, to identify him as the real 
Sloughter. Stoll gravely told the governor that he was 
glad to find in him the same man he had known at 
home. 

'* Yes," said the governor, ** I have been seen in 
England, and now intend to be seen in New York." 

He refused to treat with Stoll, however, and again 
sent Ingoldsby to the fort to demand its surrender and 
to order Leisler and his council to report forthwith to 
the governor, and to bring Bayard and Nicolls with them. 
But Leisler refused, declaring it would be against all 
military precedent to deliver up a fort at midnight. A 
third time the messenger was sent, and a third time he 
was " contemptuously refused." Then governor and 
councilors retired with an agreement to meet at an 
early hour next morning. 

They were very early at the City Hall. During the 
night the governor had matured his plans. Ignoring a 
humble letter from Leisler in which the latter asserted 
his loyalty and offered to " give an exact account of 
all his acts," he ordered Ligoldsby to go to the fort and 
command the men at arms to submit, promising pardon 
to all but Leisler and his council. When this was done 
the men laid down their arms and gave up Leisler and 
his councilors, who were led prisoners to the City Hall. 
Then the heavy doors of the cells in the fort were 
thrown back, and Bayard and Nicolls brought forth, aged 
and worn to skeletons almost by their thirteen months 
of captivity. They were met with good wishes, min- 



95 

gled with expressions ot pity, and conducted to the City 
Hall, where they took the oath of office amid the cheers 
of the people. But Leisler and his councilors were 
thrust into the cells that had just been vacated by their 
victims ; the chain that Bayard had worn was put on the 
leg of Leisler. 

Soon the people began to clamor for the punishment 
of Leisler and his friends. A speedy trial was demanded 
by the accused and granted by Sloughter. On March 
23, three days after the surrender, the prisoners were 
examined and bound over for trial. The case was at 
once given to the grand jury, which found a true bill 
against Leisler, Millborne, and eight others, charging 
them with '' holding by force the king's fort against the 
king's governor, after publication of his commission, and 
after demand had been made in the king's name, and in 
the reducing of which lives had been lost." 

The court sat March 30, and the trial proceeded for 
eight da3^s with all the solemnity and stately ceremonial 
common in those days. A very august tribunal it was, 
too, of ten stern judges in flowing black robes and pow- 
dered, full-bottomed wigs — Dudley, the chief justice of 
the province, Thomas Johnson, Sir Robert Robinson, 
former governor of Bermuda, Jasper Hicks, captain of 
\\\^ Archangel, Lieutenant Governor Ingoldsby, Colonel 
William Smith, Major John Lawrence, Recorder Pin- 
horn, John Young, and Isaac Arnold — men chosen be- 
cause they had suffered little or nothing from the 
prisoners, and who would be more likely, therefore, to 
judge them fairly. 

When brought before them Leisler and Millborne 



96 

declined to plead at all until the court should decide 
whether the king's letter to Nicholson conferred the 
government upon Leisler. The court referred the ques- 
tion to Governor Sloughter and his council, and they 
declared in writing that neither in the king's letter nor 
in the papers of the privy council was there the slightest 
authority for the prisoner to seize upon the government. 
This swept away any defense the prisoners may have 
hoped to make ; for unless they could prove authority 
they stood convicted of treason and murder, the penalty 
of which was death. 

They did the very best thing possible under the cir- 
cumstances — they refused to plead and appealed to the 
king. The eight other prisoners pleaded not guilty. 
Notwithstanding, the trial proceeded. Leisler, Millborne, 
and six of the other prisoners were found guilty ; two 
were acquitted; and Chief Justice Dudley, assuming the 
black cap, passed sentence of death upon the eight. 

But Sloughter hesitated to order their execution ; he 
had grave doubts as to his authority to sign a death 
warrant in the case of an appeal to the king. " Never 
greater villains lived," he wrote King William, " but I 
am resolved to wait your pleasure, if by any other 
means than hanging I can keep the people quiet." 

But he soon found that there was no other way. 
Scores of petitions and remonstrances from Dutch and 
English, and even from the Indians, against clemency 
were thrust upon him. So many had suffered griev- 
ous wrongs, either in person or property, from the 
usurper that the demand for his execution was general. 
The two Dutch clergymen are said to have openly ad- 



97 

vocated his de-a-th from the pulpit. Ladies of high sta- 
tion, sufferers from Leisler's tyranny, pleaded with the 
governor to sign the death warrant ; the most eminent 
and loyal men of the province said to him that there 
could be no peace nor quietness while the leaders lived, 
and threatened to remove from the country unless the 
sentence was carried out. On the other hand, there came 
many petitions from the friends and families of the con- 
demned, praying for clemency, so that between them 
the poor governor was nearly at his wit's end. But one 
day there came news from Albany that the Mohawk 
Indians, whom Leisler had greatly angered by his acts, 
had threatened to join the French as allies unless their 
enemy was executed. 

On receipt of this news the governor and council met, 
and resolved that for the satisfaction of the Indians and 
to quiet the province it was necessary that the sentence 
against the principal offenders *' be forthwith executed." 
This was laid before the House of Representatives, which 
the governor had convened, and that body indorsed the 
action of the governor and council. Sloughter there- 
fore signed the death warrant, and Leisler and Millborne 
were executed. 

The former met his fate with firmness and dignity. 
In his speech upon the gallows he begged that all dis- 
cord and dissension about him might be buried with his 
ashes, and declared that in all he had done his sole aim 
had been to advance " the interests of William and 
Mary, and of the Reformed Protestant churches of these 
parts." 

Perhaps the fairest judgment that could be passed 

TODD, N. Y. — 7 



98 

Upon this puzzling^ character is that he was of unbal- 
anced mind, half crazed by fear of aristocratic and 
popish plots and by the possession of unlimited power. 
Regarded from any standpoint, it was a most unfortu- 
nate affair, and retarded the growth of the colony not a 
little. For, despite Leisler's prayer, the spirit of faction 
survived his death, and for half a century the " Leisler- 
ites," as they were called, continued to exercise a dis- 
turbing influence on the politics of the city. 

When the matter came before King William on Leis- 
ler's appeal he decided that the sentence was a righteous 
one and sustained the judges. On the ground of 
former loyal services rendered by Leisler, however, he 
restored to the latter's heirs his estates, which had been 
confiscated for treason, and four years later Parliament, 
on the petition of the friends of Leisler, " to promote 
peace and heal the scars of the civil war," reversed the 
decree of attainder which had been pronounced against 
Leisler, thus removing the attaint from his family. 



IX. THE APPROACH OF THE 
REVOLUTION. 

FROM 1 69 1 to 1764 the history of New York pre- 
sents no events of great importance. During this 
period she grew in wealth, population, and commerce 
but slowly, the acts of the British government greatly 
restricting her foreign trade, and the many wars with 
the French and Indians on the north retarding her 
growth in numbers. Politically this period was marked 
by the almost constant struggle of her people for more 
liberty — liberty of trade, liberty to govern themselves, 
liberty of speech, and a free press. Some striking in- 
cidents and romantic phases of the period may be 
touched upon briefly. 

Governor Sloughter died suddenly about two months 
after the execution of Leisler, — some said from poison, — 
and in 1692 was succeeded by Colonel Benjamin 
Fletcher. This gentleman was a brave soldier who had 
seen service in the Low Countries; he was a courtier 
too, shrewd, pliant, persuasive, politic, not to be praised 
for all that he did, but perhaps the best man for the 
place that could have been found. He allayed in a 
measure the angry passions that had been aroused in 
Leisler's time; he soothed and pacified the Indians, and 
he practically founded the Trinity Church of to-day, by 

99 



lOO 



giving it the rev^enues of the King's Farm, which be- 
longed to him as governor ; indeed, the inscription on the 
first Trinity Church built in New York, completed in 1696, 
stated that it was chiefly " enriched and promoted by the 
bounty of his Excellency Colonel Benjamin Fletcher." 

During Governor Fletcher's reign the privateers 
brought a great deal of booty to New York. " King 
William's War," between France and England, which 
broke out in 1688- 1 689, put many of this class upon 
the seas. A privateer was a private vessel commis- 
sioned by its government to go out and capture on the 
high seas an enemy's vessel wherever it might be found. 
But many of them when once at sea captured all vessels, 

whether friend or foe, and thus became 
pirates, and the common enemies of 
mankind. It was the scandal of 
Governor Fletcher's reign that 
these pirates were per- 
mitted to harbor in the 
city equally with the pri- 
vateers, and often in the 
guise of their more honest 
-, brethren. Both classes 
brought great store of 



wealth to the city — East India 
goods, rare fabrics of Teheran 
and Samarkand, Arabian gold, 
ivory, and slaves from the African coast. The pirate 
captains were marked figures on the streets. One of 
them is described as having been a slight, dark man 
of about forty, who scattered gold with prodigality. 




101 

He wore a uniform " rich and elegant, a blue cap 
with a band of cloth of silver, a blue jacket bordered 
with gold braid and garnished with large buttons 
of mother-of-pearl." He wore loose trousers of white 
linen, gathered at the knee into curiously clocked stock- 
ings. A long chain of Arabian gold was thrown about 
his neck, and in his knitted waistbelt gleamed a dagger, 
its hilt set with sparkling diamonds. Men accoutered 
like this, treating everybody who would drink to huge 
draughts of Sopus ale, and throwing golden louis d'ors 
about as carelessly as stivers, were familiar objects in 
New York at that time. 

But the East India Company, which owned many of 
the vessels captured by them, soon made bitter com- 
plaint to the home government, alleging that the pirates 
were harbored in New York, and their ill-gotten booty 
purchased by her merchants; and as Colonel Fletcher 
was not very successful in catching them, he was recalled, 
and Richard, Earl of Bellomont, an Irish nobleman of 
the highest character, who had been very active against 
the freebooters, was appointed captain general of New 
York and New England, with special orders to stamp 
out piracy. 

But Bellomont did not make a very successful gov- 
ernor. He was too austere, cold, bigoted, prejudiced ; 
he arrived with the fixed idea that the chief men of the 
colony, including Fletcher, were imbued with piracy, 
and had no hesitation in so stating publicly. Almost 
his first official act was a very unwise one : he restored 
to the families of Leisler and Millborne their estates 
that had been forfeited, and as these had by this time 



102 

passed into the hands of third parties, who had bought 
legally, the attempt to evict them nearly caused a riot, 
and at once excited factional feelings that had nearly 
died out. He did not show any greater tact in his 
attempts to suppress piracy and smuggling, and to re- 
cover from the great landed proprietors and the churches 
the large grants of land which Fletcher had given 
them. To stamp out the former he seized goods and 
arrested persons simply on suspicion, dismissed the 
highest officials without a hearing, and removed mem- 
bers of the council to fill their places with men of his 
own party. To remedy the latter evil he prepared a 
bill vacating all land grants made by former governors, 
and prohibiting any one person from holding over one 
thousand acres of land. One of the grants aimed at by 
this law was that of Domine Dellius, a Dutch Reformed 
clergyman of Albany, who had first secured it from the 
Indians, and later had had it confirmed by Fletcher; 
another was the grant to Trinity Church. Because of 
this zeal without knowledge the governor very soon had 
arrayed against him the clergy, the principal men of the 
colony, the merchants, and the king's officers. His only 
friends were the Leislerites, and soon the province was 
torn with the quarrels of the factions. Colonel Fletcher 
meantime was clamoring to have his accounts with the 
colony settled, that lie might go to England with his 
vouchers and have his conduct as governor investigated 
by the Lords of Trade. Having served under the 
crown for thirty-five }-ears without reproach, he said, 
lie did not think he should become a castaway in the 
rear of his days. 



103 

Governor Bellomont died suddenly on the 5th of 
March, 1701, and was buried under the chapel of the 
fort. What would have been the outcome of his gov- 
ernment had he lived it is impossible to say ; as it was, 
he left the colony in much worse condition than he 
found it. 

King William died on March 8, 1702, and was suc- 
ceeded by Queen Anne of the Stuart line, who proved 
so excellent a ruler that her subjects called her " good 
Queen Anne." She was very charitable, especially to 
the struggling colonial churches. Among other gifts 
she bestowed on Trinity Church, in 1705, the Annetje 
Jans estate, a tract of some sixty acres lying above 
Chambers Street, on the west side of Broadway, which 
now, with the King's Farm before mentioned, yields 
princely revenues. 

In I 725 quite an event occurred in the birth of the first 
newspaper New York had ever seen — the " Gazette." 















New York in 1720. 



It was but a mite when compared with our present 
mammoth editions, being printed on a half sheet of 
foolscap paper. It contained almost no local news, for- 
eign letters and customhouse entries taking up most of 



104 

the space. William Bradford, printer to the govern- 
ment, was editor and proprietor. 

After nine years the *' Gazette " found a rival in a 
new paper called the ** Weekly Journal," and edited by 
John Peter Zenger. Zenger was a German Protestant 
who had been forced from his home on the Rhine bv 
the armies of France, and coming to this country with 
Governor Hunter in 1710, a mere lad, had been appren- 
ticed to William Bradford. Now grown to manhood, 
he turned his guns on his former teacher ; for the " Jour- 
nal," being the organ of the Whig or people's party, 
was bitterly opposed to the " Gazette," which was the 
organ of the governor and council, the conservatives, the 
vested interests. Whatever the " Journal " could do to 
bring into contempt the " aristocrats," as it called the 
governor and his party, it did. It attacked the governor, 
the council, the assemblymen — everybody and every- 
thing connected with the ruling class. Squibs, lampoons, 
ballads, witticism, satire, whatever would serve its pur- 
pose, all were made use of without stint. At last the 
people had an organ in which to make their wants and 
grievances known, and they appreciated it ; it was the 
forerunner of the ''Heralds," "Tribunes," "Suns," 
" Worlds," and " Journals " of a later period. 

Bradford replied, defending the governor and his 
party ; but his editorials lacked the pith and \igor of 
Zenger's, as you will see if you go to the public library 
and ask to see the journals in question. At length the 
government did what was best calculated to heighten 
the people's respect for their editor and increase his in- 
fluence: it declared four issues of the "Weekly Jour- 



I05 

nal " " libelous," and ordered them burned by the public 
hangman, at the same time directing the mayor and 
aldermen, who were of the popular party, to attend and 
witness the ceremony. But the spirit of resistance was 
abroad, and the mayor and magistrates refused to obey 
the order; they said it was arbitrary and without war- 
rant of law. Then Governor Cosby, a weak man, and 
his advisers went still further: they seized Zenger and 
threw him into prison on a charge of criminal libel. 
Where he had had one friend before he now had ten. 
Men rallied not so much to his aid as to the defense of 
a free press, and to the right of the people to criticise 
their officials. The excitement spread to the neighbor- 
ing colonies, where the issue of the trial was awaited 
with the greatest interest. The leaders of the popular 
party in New York at this time were two lawyers named 
James Alexander and William Smith ; both at once vol- 
unteered to defend Zenger. Smith had been recorder 
of the city, and was noted for his captivating eloquence ; 
Alexander had been surveyor general, and was also 
noted for legal ability as well as for his silver tongue. 
Unfort-unately, their zeal led them to make a grave mis- 
take at the outset : they boldly challenged the legality 
of the commissions of Chief Justice de Lancey and of 
Justice Phillipse, the two judges who composed the 
court that was to try Zenger, on the ground that they 
were not worded in the usual form, and had been issued 
by Governor Cosby without consent of the council. 

Judge de Lancey was of Huguenot ancestry, of the 
aristocratic party, stout, florid, pompous in manner, a 
great stickler for the dignity and prerogatives of his 



io6 

office, and held this plea of the attorneys to be a gross 
contempt of court. As soon as he could command his 
voice, he said : " You have brought it to that pass, sirs, 
that either we must go from the bench or you from the 
bar," and he excluded them from further practice, 
assigning John Chambers to defend Zenger. There 
was no appeal for the disbarred attorneys in that day ; 
but they were men of resources, and they hastened to 
Philadelphia, and secured, to assist Chambers, Andrew 
Hamilton, reputed the ablest and most eloquent advo- 
cate then in the colonies. At the same time, through 
the press and by private conversation in the clubs and 
coffeehouses, they made public the story of their own 
wrongs and the merits and demerits of the case. 

When the trial was called, in July, 1735, Hamilton 
appeared eager for the fray, and was greeted with shouts 
of approval by the people, who saw in him the cham- 
pion of popular rights. His first reply to the indictment 
was that the articles in the "Journal" could not be 
libelous, because they were true. Bradley, the king's 
attorney general, took exception to this plea, and quoted 
the old English law that even the truth if repeated with 
intent to injure another was libelous, and punishable as 
such. 

So all summer the legal battle raged with varying 
fortunes to the combatants, and all summer the entire 
body of the colonies watched and waited to see if the 
press was to be muzzled, or left to be the Argus-eyed 
exposer of official corruption, and the defender of the 
people's rights. At length, after a charge by the judge 
unfavorable to the prisoner, the case was given to the 



I07 



jury, who, after being out but a few moments, returned 
with a verdict of " Not guilty." 

The people received it with shouts of approval, and 
were so delighted that they would have borne Hamil- 
ton to his hotel on their shoulders, but he would not 
permit it. The corporation, how^ever, tendered him a 
banquet, at which he was presented by the mayor with 
the freedom of the city in a gold box ; and the same 
evening a grand ball was given in his honor. In this 
first openly avowed and distinct contest for their rights, 
the people won a great victory. 

The closing days of British rule in New York were 
marked by the founding of one of the city's noblest in- 
stitutions, Columbia College. By 1751, after many 
years of eflfort, the 

sum of ;^3,443 had „ ^ ,_^ "- "^ > 

been raised by lot- 
tery and public 
subscription to 
found a college in 
New York, and a 
bill was passed by 










v'fi £ F f f f :£ E" i. I E 1 i 1 1 M 1 ,. 
??-t f i E i i|i E i F 1 1 1 i f ft' 



,;Ji'-. 



■_.:■■■-.- :-^"-i^-ai,. 



-^.-^v 



r^ 




iii|i*i^y" 



King's College in 1758. 



the legislature naming ten trustees to take charge of it. 
In I 752 the vestry of Trinity Church offered to give a site 
and the necessary grounds for a campus. This offer was 
accepted, and in 1753 the trustees invited the Rev. Dr. 
Samuel Johnson, an eminent clergyman of that day, to 
be the first president. His salary w^as ;^2 50 a year. 
The college was first opened in the autumn of 1753, in 
the vestry room of Trinity Church, with an entering 
class of ten. On August 2^, 1756, the corner stone of 



io8 

a new building was laid by Governor Charles Hardy 
with appropriate ceremonies. Its site and grounds 
covered the whole block now bounded by College Place, 
Barclay, Church, and Murray streets, and the new 
building was first opened to students in May, 1 760. 
During the Revolution no sessions were held, the 
building being used by the British as a hospital. On 
the return of peace the college was reorganized and its 
name changed from King's to Columbia. 



X. THE PEOPLE UNDER BRITISH RULE. 

VERY soon after the British came the tone of soci- 
ety in New York was ahiiost wholly changed, the 
English language, customs, and manners largely sup- 
planting the Dutch. New York, with the large influx 
of immigrants from England and the New England 
States, became a miniature London, English to the core. 
She celebrated with fete and procession the birthdays 
of the king, queen, and members of the royal family. 
She donned the outward and visible signs of mourning 
at their decease. The governor and his official family, 
the officers of the garrison, the patroons, professional 
men, and retired merchants formed an upper or court 
circle and gave tone to society. In place of the simple, 
domestic, democratic social system of the Dutch came 
in the English one of classes. London fashions soon 
became popular, although, as William Smith, a local his- 
torian, observed, " by the time we adopt them they be- 
come disused in England." London tradesmen, tailors, 
peruke makers, and teachers came with them, and greater 
elegance in dress, equipage, houses, and furniture was 
the result. 

Among the distinguished company that accompa- 
nied Governor Andros in 1678 was the Rev. James 
Wooley, who had recently taken holy orders, and who 

109 



I lO 

had been commissioned cliaplain to the king's army in 
New York. This gentleman used his eyes and ears to 
good purpose, and on his return to London wrote a Httle 
book called " A Two Years' Journal in New York," 
which gives some pleasant glimpses of the social life of 
our city at that time (1678- 1680). " The country," he 
wrote, " is of a sweet and wholesome breath, free from 
those annoyances which are commonly ascribed by 
naturalists to the insalubrity of any country, viz., south 
or southeast winds, stagnant waters, lowness of shoals, 
inconstancy of weather, and the excessive heat of the 
summer; it is gently refreshed, fanned, and allayed by 
constant breezes from the sea." 

The people he found very friendly and hospitable, 
though "a clan of high-flown religionists." The two 
domines, the Lutheran and Dutch Reformed, he found 
it necessary to rebuke for their unfriendly and unchris- 
tian attitude tow^ard each other. He passes to this 
description of what was then a favorite recreation: 

*' We had a very good diversion in an orchard of Mr. 
John Robinson of New York, where \wq followed a bear 
from tree to tree^ upon which he could swarm like a cat ; 
and when he was got to his resting place, perched upon 
a high branch, w^e dispatched a youth after him with a 
club to an opposite bough, who knocking his paws, he 
comes grumbling down backward with a thump, so we 
after him again." 

Every New Year's day, Mr. Wooley tells us, the 
English observed " a neighborly commerce of presents." 
One sent him a sugar loaf, another a pair of gloves, a 
third a bottle or two of wine. 



Ill 

One day he saw '' two Dutch boors " grappHng under 
his window. " I called up an acquaintance and asked 
him to fetch a kit full of water and discharge it at 
them, which immersion cooled their courage and loosed 
their grip. So we used to part our mastiffs in 
England." 

The city of New York he described as being *' as large 
as some market towns with us, and all built the London 
way." "The diversion, especially in the winter season 
and by the Dutch, is aurigation, i.e., riding about in 
wagons [probably straw rides] ; . . . and upon the ice 
it is admirable to see men and women as it were fly- 
ing upon their skates from place to place with markets 
[baskets] upon their heads and backs." 

When our author returned he took with him as sou- 
venirs *' a gray squirrel, a parrot, and a raccoon." 

While Mr. Wooley was preaching to the garrison In 
the fort there arrived in New York two young men in 
queer scallop hats and long coats, who had been sent 
from Germany by a sternly religious Protestant order 
there — the Labadists — to find a location in this country 
for one of their communities. These men were clever, 
with a great thirst for knowledge, and went prying all 
over the country, letting nothing escape their eyes and 
pens and pencils. 

In New York they were " regaled on milk and 
peaches, fish and fruit." The most interesting part of 
their book to us describes a tour they made through the 
length and breadth of the present borough of Brooklyn 
in October, 1679. Crossing the ferry on September 
29, they climbed a hill, and .then rode " along open 



112 

roads and woody places, and through a village called 
Breuckelen, which has a small ugly church standing in 
the middle of the road." 

That night they spent in the farmhouse of one Simon 
de Hart, and had for supper a roasted haunch of veni- 
son, a goose, a wild turkey, and oysters both raw and 
roasted, anci they sat up with their host late into the night 
before a great hickory fire that roared hospitably up 
the chimney. From his house they visited New lltrecht, 
and were received by Jacques Cortelyou, who li\ed in a 
stone house, one of several in the village, and united the 
callings of land surveyor, mathematician, and doctor of 
medicine. Because of illness in their host's family they 
were obliged to sleep in the barn, which they did on 
straw spread with sheepskins, " amid the continual grunt- 
ing of hogs, squealing of pigs, bleating and coughing of 
sheep, barking of dogs, crowing of cocks, and cackling 
of hens." After several days they leisurely retraced 
their steps to New York, noting on the way the Indian 
villages, the wild grapes, peach orchards, and fields of 
watermelons. This Cortelyou house will again appear 
in our story. 

The era of the privateers and " Red Sea men," who 
flooded the city with East India goods and Arabian 
gold (i 700-1 705), was marked by the most lavish dis- 
play and extravagance, Broadway of a Sunday morn- 
ing must then have presented a brilliant and animated 
spectacle as the throng of fair women and courtly men 
moved along it on the way to service. Trinity, or " the 
English church," first opened in 1696, and the new 
Dutch church on Garden Street, built in 1693, were then 



113 

the fashionable places of worship, though Trinity, as the 
church of the court circle, took precedence. 

Among the distinguished company are Governor Lord 
Bellomont, tall and stern, James de Lancey, the law- 
yer, who will be later chief justice and lieutenant gov- 




" Broadway of a Sunday morning." 



ernor, Isaac de Riemer, the Huguenot and mayor of 
the city, Colonel Nicholas Bayard and Mrs. Bayard, 
Dr. Samuel Staats and his wife, a beautiful East Indian 
princess, Frederick Phillipse, Gabriel Minvielle, Thomas 
Willett, Richard Townley, and John Lawrence, of the 
king's council, James Graham and James Emott, the 
distinguished lawyers, Abraham Gouverneur, George 

TODD, N. Y,— 8 



114 

Hcathcote, Johannes and Abraham de Peyster, and 
other able men of that day. 

And how were they dressed? Certain old family 
inventories enable us to describe their costumes with as 
much detail as though we were a society reporter of 
1705 sent out for the purpose. Colonel Bayard, for 
instance, wears a long-skirted, cinnamon-colored cloth 
coat, embroidered four or five inches deep with silver 
lace, and lined with sky-blue silk ; his waistcoat is of red 
satin inwoven with gold ; his breeches are of the same 
color and material as his coat, and are trimmed with 
silver braid at the pockets and knees. His lower hmbs 
and feet are covered with dove-colored stockings of silk 
and low shoes set off with bright silver buckles. His 
broad-brimmed black hat of felt is adorned with a band 
of gold lace. His full-bottomed wig is sprinkled with 
starch finely ground and sifted, to which burnt alabaster 
or whiting has been added to give it body, and is 
scented with ambergris. The ends of his " steenkirk," 
or neckcloth of fine muslin, are laced and tucked into his 
expansive shirt bosom ; the latter being of fine holland 
adorned with colbertine ruffles, to display which the 
waistcoat is left open. His snuff is daintily scented, and 
contained in an elegant ivory box with an invisible 
hinge and a looking-glass in the lid. 

When he has occasion to use his handkerchief we see 
that it is of the finest silk and ornamented with the 
British arms, while on its folds are printed or painted the 
ensigns and standards captured from the French, per- 
haps in some action at which the colonel was present. 
And when he draws forth his watch to note the hour 



115 

we notice the beautiful shagreen case studded with gold 
which protects it, and which has his seal and watch key- 
attached by a wide silk ribbon. He flourishes a cane 
with an elegant gold head engraved with crown and 
cipher; but his diamond-hilted sword with its gay sword 
knot, which every gentleman wears when fully dressed, 
has been left behind because of the sacred character of 
the day. 

The other gentlemen are dressed in the same style, 
although there is a pleasing variety in color and material. 

If the gentlemen are thus brilliant, the ladies appear 
brilliant as emperor moths. Mrs. Bayard, for instance, 
wears in place of a bonnet a *' frontage," a kind of head- 
dress made of rows of plaited muslin reenforced with wire, 
one rising above the other, and growing smaller as they 
rise. She also wears the steenkirk. The bodice of her 
purple-and-gold atlas gown is laced over very tight 
stays, and the gown itself is cut away in front to display 
the black velvet petticoat, edged with two silver orrices, 
and high enough to show the green silk stockings and 
richly embroidered shoes of fine morocco with red 
clocks. Her hair is also powdered, and she is per- 
fumed with rose water and eatt de Came. Some of the 
younger ladies are even more richly dressed. Dr. 
Staats's stately East Indian princess appears in purple 
and gold ; a pretty little lady behind her wears a satin 
gown over an Alijah petticoat striped with green, gold, 
and white ; another gown is flowered with green and 
gold, over a scarlet-and-gold atlas petticoat edged with 
silver. 

As the last tones of the bell cease the brilliant com- 



ii6 

pany is lost in the churches, and the street is left to 
Indians and negro slaves. 

The latter were an important element of the popula- 
tion all through colony days and for some years after the 
Revolution. We meet them everywhere — in the fields, 
on the streets, bringing water, marketing, serving, herd- 
ing, doing most of the menial work of the town. There 
were three classes of slaves — negroes, Indians, and white 
immigrants, or redemptioners. The negroes were mostly 
native Africans imported direct from Angola or Mada- 
gascar, or indirectly from the West Indies in the colony 
vessels. They still preserved their native savagery, and 
were an element of fear to the more timorous. Twice 
there was an uprising among them, in i 7 1 2 and 1 74 1 , and 
a plot, as was charged, to murder all the males and cap- 
ture the town ; but both were easily put down. The 
Indian slaves were probably captives taken in war or 
condemned to servitude for petty crimes. The Euro- 
peans were those who agreed with the captains who 
gave them a passage over to serve a certain time after 
landing until the passage money should be discharged 
by their wages. To prove these statements take the 
following advertisements from newspapers of the day : 

In 1 751: "Likely negroes, men and women, im- 
ported from the coast of Africa, ... to be sold by 
Thomas Grenell." 

In I 732 : " Just arrived from Great Britain and to be 
sold on board the ship Alice and Elizabeth, Captain 
Paine commander, several likely Welsh and English 
serving men, most of them tradesmen." 

In I 747 : " Run away on April the 25th, from Captain 



117 

Abraham Kip in New York, an Indian man about eigh- 
teen years old and speaks good English." 

Having seen the Dutch city, we shall wish to visit it 
now under its English masters, and note the changes 
that have occurred. It has certainly grown and solidi- 
fied, so to speak, since our visit in 1664, a hundred 

A Plan o|k,ihe City of New York from an adlual Survev 




Facsimile o^ok crt^tn.2/ . Hap m Me /rajJ^Ufw/t ^/ O ^ Smtl/t /tye-fi (i'm^nuj'WfUf-^ /*t^^ fy (^.fft^trftnt. /.U^t^f^A^r 



years ago. The city now has crept north as far as 
Warren Street on the west, and Chatham on the east, 
while a village plot appears on the west of the " High 
Road to Boston " (the present Bowery). There is a new 
wall of palisades extending from the East River through 
Franklin Square and ** the Swamp " to the line of the 
present Canal Street, and thence to the North River, 



ii8 

with a blockhouse and gates at Chatham Street, Broad- 
way, and the waterside. The great pond called the 
Kolch, or Collect (on the site of the present Tombs and 
to the eastward of it), still remains, while the Swamp 
(now devoted to the busy warehouses of the hide and 
leather men)' is covered with tan vats and tanneries. 









mffiTi^ 



M'i^' 'A •■^•'•^ 







"X x. 




The Battery in 1746. 



Most of the streets within the city limits are paved, 
and lighted by lanterns suspended from every seventh 
house. There is a fire company of "four and twenty 
able-bodied men," and two fire engines " of Mr. Newn- 
ham's patent," the latter just imported from London, 

1 This somewhat famous locality lay south of the present approach to 
the East River Bridge and west of Franklin Square, extending nearly to 
North William Street. 



119 

and a "rattle watch" that patrols the streets at 
night. 

We will begin our stroll at the Battery. The fort is 
still there, very little changed, but it has a new name — 
Fort George — after the reigning king, for it is named 
anew with each new ruler that comes to the throne. It 
is still the seat of government. Here is the governor's 
dwelling, called the *' Government House," and a garri- 
son of regular troops — two lieutenants, one ensign, three 
sergeants, two drummers, a master gunner, one hundred 
privates, four " matrosses," a *' chirurgeon " (surgeon), 
a storekeeper, and a chaplain. And the governor needs 
them all, for what with French and Indian descents 
from the north, rumors of popish plots, uprisings of 
slaves, and quarrels with the colonial legislature, his 
post is no sinecure. 

His residence is also the social capitol, and " high 
doings" often took place there in the old colony days. 
No fete day, whether the anniversary of the birth of 
king, queen, or prince of the royal blood, the coming 
of an heir to the throne, the advent of a new governor, 
or a great national event, can pass without the holding 
of a grand ball at Government House, to which come 
the beauty and chivalry of the town. For instance, on 
October 30, 1734, it being the anniversary of his 
Majesty's birthday : *' In the evening the whole city was 
illuminated. His Excellency and Lady gave a splen- 
did ball and supper at the Fort, where was the most 
numerous and fine appearance of Ladies and Gentlemen 
that had ever been known upon the like occasion." 

Imposing ceremonies had preceded this event: 



1 20 

" Between the hours of eleven and twelve in the fore- 
noon, His ICxccUency our Goxernor was attended at* 
his House in Fort George by tlie Council, Assembly, 
Merchants, and other Principal Gentlemen and Inhabi- 
tants of this and adjacent places. The Independent 
Companies posted here being under Arms, and the Can- 
non round the Ramparts firing while His Majesty's, the 
Oueen's, the Prince's, and the RoN'al Families', and 
their Roval Hiii:;hnesses the Prince and Princess of 
Orange's Healths were drunk, and then followed the 
Healths of His Grace the Duke of Newcastle, of the 
Duke of Grafton, of the Right Honorable Sir Robert 
Walpole, and many other Royal Healths." 

At the coronation of King George, June ii, 1734, 
much the same ceremony w^as observed at the governor's 
mansion, and " afterwards His Excellency, attended by 
the Gentlemen of the Council, etc., went into the Field 
[the present City Hall Park], and received the Militia 
of the City drawn up there, and expressed great sat- 
isfaction at their order, discipline, and appearance, 
and was pleased to order twelve barrels of beer to be 
distributed among them to drink their Majesties' and 
the Royal Healths." 

When a new governor came — which was pretty often 
— he was received with much state and ceremony. 
Thus when William Cosby arrived in July, 1732, he 
landed " about ten o'clock in the evening, and was re- 
ceived at the Waterside by several Gentlemen, who 
attended him to the Fort. The next dav, between the 
Hours of eleven and twelve, His Excellency walked to 
the City Hall (a company of Halberdiers and a Troop of 



121 

Horse marching" before, and the Gentlemen of His 
Majesty's Council, the Corporation, and a great number 
of Gentlemen and Merchants of this city following, the 
streets being lined on each side with the Militia), where 
his Commission was published [i.e., read], and then His 
Excellency returned, attended as before, back to the 
Fort. The Militia then drew up on the Parade and saluted 
him with three volleys." 

Leaving the Battery and its memories, let us walk up 




4>- 



^" 



• ■ ■ iliiliiiiili aa 





5*~PT^~^ii^ Eii^,^ -.^i _-- 



City Hall, Wall Street. 

Broad Street to the corner of Nassau and Wall. The 
canal in the middle of Broad Street has been filled in, 
and the street itself is lined with handsome dwellings. 
At the northeast corner of the last-named streets (where 
now stands the gray granite pile of the Subtreasury, 
with its statue of Washington looking calmly on the 
hurrying crowds) is the new City Hall, which we shall 
refer to later as the cradle of national existence., 



122 

The city built it in 1700, at a cost of three thousand 
pounds, and sold the old City Hall, built by Kieft, for 
nine hundred and twenty pounds to help defray the 
cost. Here the Provincial Assembly and the governor's 
council hold their sessions, and the Supreme Court and 
the mayor's and admiralty courts meet. Here, too, the 
ro3^al governors publish their commissions, and the new 
mayors also. 

The latter ceremonies are attended with more pomp 
than in later days. Thus, Mayor Thomas Noell, who 
took the oath here in 1701, records in his diary: 

"On Tuesday, the 14th day of October, 1701, I was 
commissioned and sworn Mayor of the City of New 
York, before the Honorable John Nanfan, Esq., Lieu- 
tenant Governor of this Province, and Council, in His 
Majesty's Fort, William Henry, and from thence accord- 
ing to the usual solemnity I went to Trinity Church, 
where was a sermon preached by Mr. Vesey, which 
ended, I went to the City Hall, attended by the Re- 
corder, Aldermen, and Assistants, and other officers, 
when, after the ringing of three bells, I published my 
Commission, and then went up into the Courthouse, and 
took the chair, when Isaac de Riemer, Esq., the late 
Mayor, delivered to me the charter and seals of this 
city." 

Visitors of distinction were usually received at the 
City Hall. Thus when Lord Augustus Fitz Roy arrived 
in I 732 to marry Governor Cosby's daughter, the mayor, 
aldermen, and assistants waited on him, attended by the 
chief officers of the city regiment, ** and being intro- 
duced to his Lordship in the Council Chamber, the Re- 



123 

corder addressed himself to him in the name of the 
Corporation, congratulating his Lordship on his safe 
arrival, and returning the thanks of the city for the 
Honor they received by his Lordship's presence, as also 
for his Lordship's condescension in being pleased to 
become a member thereof. Then the Worshipful 
the Mayor presented his Lordship with the copy 
of his Freedom, to which was annexed the city seal 
inclosed in a curious Gold Box, with the arms of the 
city thereon neatly engraved ; which his Lordship 
was pleased to receive with the greatest Goodness 
and Complaisance, and likewise to assure the Corpora- 
tion that he should always entertain the kindest senti- 
ments of this Expression of their Regard and Esteem 
for him." 

This " gold box " was made by Charles Le Roux, the 
Tiffany of those days. His bill for it was for the gold (one 
ounce twelve pennyweights) ^lO 8.?., and for " fashione 
and engraving the Box " ^4, in all £i^ ^s., or over 
seventy dollars of our money. When Major Alexander 
Cosby, the governor's brother, and Thomas Freeman 
of London, visited the city the next year (i 733-1 734), 
that the latter might marry the governor's second 
daughter, the freedom of the city was tendered them 
in a silver " Guilt Box " that cost, for the two, 
£-] IS. iiyid. 

At the head of Wall Street stands Trinity Church, 
erected in 1696, as before said, and greatly enlarged and 
improved in i J^J . The first edifice is said to have been 
one hundred and forty-eight feet long by seventy-two 
feet wide, with a steeple, the pride of the city, one hun- 



124 

dred and seventy-five feet high. Over the great door 
was a sonorous Latin inscription, which done into the 
Enghsh of that day read as follows : 

" This Trinity Church was founded in the eighth year 
of the Most Illustrious Sovereign Lord William III., 
by the Grace of God, King of England, Scotland, 
France, and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, and in the 
year of our Lord 1696, and was built by the voluntary 
contributions and gifts of some persons, and chiefly en- 
riched and promoted by the bounty of his Excellency 
Colonel Benjamin Fletcher, captain general and gov- 
ernor in chief of this province, in the time of whose 
government the inhabitants of this city, of the Protes- 
tant religion of the Church of England, as now estab- 
lished by law, were incorporated by a charter under the 
seal of the province ; and many other valuable gifts he 
gave to it of his private fortune." 

This edifice was destroyed in the great fire of 1776, 
and rebuilt in 1790. The present beautiful Gothic 
structure was built in 1846. 

It is but a few steps down Wall Street to the water 
front, then, as later, one of the most fascinating portions 
of the city. To make its round in our own time is to 
come in contact with the tongues, costumes, and prod- 
ucts of the wide earth. To a lesser extent this was the 
case in colonial times. 

There are more docks, ships, and warehouses than 
we noticed in 1664. The pirates and privateersmen 
are the most picturesque, and in this long-roofed, low- 
porched tavern of Captain Benjamin Kierstede we shall 
probably find a score or more of them clustered about 



125 

its box stove and spinning yarns after the manner of 
sailormen. We are struck by their resemblance to 
Whittier's sea dog: 

*' Salt as the sea wind, tough and dried 
As a lean cusk from Labrador." 

They are famous fighters, and prove an efficient arm 
of the service in these bitter French and Indian wars. 
The *' London Magazine" of September, 1757, stated 
that since " the beginning of the war " (French and In- 
dian War, I 755-1 763) thirty-nine vessels, with one hun- 
dred and twenty-eight guns and one thousand and fifty 
men, had been fitted out to prey on French commerce ; 
while a letter from a merchant in New York to a friend 
in London, of January 5, 1757, declares: "There are 
now thirty Privateers out of this Place, and ten more on 
the stocks and launched." The letter writer adds that 
up to that time (1757) these vessels had brought in 
fourteen prizes, valued at over one hundred thousand 
pounds. 

The privateersmen were a brave, reckless, daredevil 
class. They displayed much ingenuity in inventing 
striking, terrible, or outre names for their vessels. Thus 
we read of the Norfolk Revenge, Game Coek, Try- 
All, Favorite Betsey, Hook- Him- Snivey, Who'd-Have- 
Thought-It, Spitfire, Sjirprise, Eagle, Tyger, Royal 
Hunter, Tory s Revenge, Little Bob,. Flying Harlequin, 
Revolution, Wheel-of- Fortune , Charming Polly, CJiarm- 
ing Peggy, Dreacijiaught, Hornet, Decoy, and others. 
Many of them made fortunes in a few months and spent 
them as quickly. Thus the privateer brig Clinton cap- 



126 

tured the French ship La Pomme.With. a cargo of indigo, 
cotton, and sugar valued at forty thousand pounds. 
The Clinton was out but six weeks, and every man be- 
fore the mast received one hundred and sixty pounds' 
prize money. Furthermore, their captain, Bevan, had 
an "ox roasted whole and mixed a hogshead of punch 
for them in the fields." 

No wonder that with such lures Governor Hamilton 
of New Jersey should complain that the privateer cap- 
tains were sweeping into their ranks the flower of the 
youth of his province. 

Many of the privateersmen turned pirates, — that is, 
attacked and took the ships of all nations, — and thus 
became the common enemies of mankind. The most 
famous of these was Captain William Kidd, who was a 
notable figure in New York in those days. When we 
first hear of him he w^as a reputable shipmaster, captain 
of the bark Antigua^ trading between New York and 
London, and well known to the merchants of both as a 
bold and skillful navigator. In his certificate of mar- 
riage to " Sarah Oort, widow," in 1691, he is styled 
** Captain William Kidd, gentleman." 

By 1694 the pirates had so increased in the Indian 
Ocean that they promised to sweep the ships of the East 
India Company from those seas, and that powerful com- 
pany appealed to the P^nglish government for protection. 
But all the king's ships were engaged in the war with 
France then raging, and could not be spared to police 
those distant waters. This fact caused the king and 
admiralty to listen with favor to a plan now proposed to 
them by Captain Kidd through his friend and patron. 



12/ 

the great Robert Livingston of New York, which was to 
fit out a private armed vessel, put it in charge of the 
aforesaid Captain Kidd, and authorize him to beat up a 
crew and go in search of the pirates. After some 
persuasion the king consented. The Adventure Galley, a 
large ship, was fitted out, and with seventy men, just 
enough to man her, Kidd sailed for New York, arriving 
in the spring of 1696. Here he had no difificulty in 
securing one hundred more men from the class described, 
and with them put to sea. But the wise old sea dogs 
of the port shook their heads over the venture. They 
said that when Captain Kidd got to sea, if he did not 
find pirates to capture and provide prize money for his 
crew, the latter would mutiny and become pirates them- 
selves — which was what happened, if the story of Kidd 
himself is to be believed. After patrolling the Ameri- 
can coast for a while without result, Kidd bore up for 
the Red Sea, and was not seen in New York for nearly 
three years, although rumors that he had himself turned 
pirate were freely bandied about. But in 1699 Kidd 
sailed into Gardiners Bay, at the east end of Long 
Island, and dispatched a message to Governor Bellomont 
at New York. In it he said that his men had mutinied 
and forced him to turn pirate ; that he had left his " large 
Moorish ship," the QiiidaJi Merchant, in the West Indies, 
and would deliver her up and a large amount of treasure 
if he could be assured a free pardon. Bellomont, who 
was in Boston when the message reached him, replied 
that if Kidd could establish his innocence he should not 
be molested. Kidd accordingly came to Boston, where 
he was arrested, and after examination was sent to Eng- 



128 

land for trial. The trial was one of the most notable in 
the United Kingdom ; it ended in his conviction, and his 
being" hanged in chains in Execution Dock in 1701. 

Such is the true story of Captain Kidd. Perhaps he 
never would have become famous but for the English 
balladmakers and our own masters of fiction, Irving and 
Poe. 

But it is time that we continued our stroll. We will 
go north along Pearl Street, which, with the cross streets 
leading out of Broadway, is the shopping center — the 
Broadway, Sixth Avenue, Fourteenth Street, and Twenty- 
third Street of i 760. The stores are plain and unpre- 
tending. In many cases the shopkeeper's family lives 
above the store. They offer all sorts of wares for sale 
under one roof, like the modern department store. The 
Wanamaker's of New York at this time is the store of 
Adolph Phillipse, Esq., a great man indeed, with a house 
in town, a manor at Phillipseborough, who has been 
king's councilor, master in chancery, judge, and speaker 
of the Assembly. He is a great merchant, too, sending 
ventures as far as India, and having a large wholesale 
store as well as retail department. His store is a brick 
building three stories high, the lower story being devoted 
to the wholesale trade, and the second to the retail. 
The former is filled with country merchants as we enter, 
sampling and tasting. A prominent feature is the great 
oaken, iron-bound chest, in which, there being neither 
safe nor bank vault, are kept the money, wampum, 
pearls, and jewelry of the establishment. 

The story above is well filled with the fair ladies of 
Manhattan, to whom the handsome merchant's rich 



129 

East India fabrics and English goods are a great attrac- 
tion. They are pricing taffeta, paduasoy, silk, tabby, 
widow's crape, brocaded lutestring, flowered Spanish 
silk, India dimity, cherry derry, and the like, that 
modern merchants would no doubt find It difficult to 
produce. 

But we will continue our walk north along Pearl 
Street, flourishing our " keanes," as the manner of men 
about town Is. What a number of markets there are, 
long, low, open buildings roofed with tiles ; the meal, 
fish, oyster, and meat markets, one at the foot of nearly 
every street. The Bear Market (now Washington), 
over on the North River front, was so called, It is said, 
because the first meat sold there was that of a bear 
shot while swimming the North River. 

There are many quaint craftsmen on the " slips " and 
short streets crossing Pearl ; for instance, this shop of 
Anthony Lamb In Old Slip, " at the sign of the Quad- 
rant and Surveying Compass," where one can buy 
''quadrants, forestaffs, nocturnals, rectifiers, universal 
scales, gunters, sliding gunters, wood or brass box com- 
passes," and so on for half a hundred instruments. At 
the house of William Bradford, " next door but one to 
the Treasurer's," lodges " Moses Slaughter, staymaker," 
from London, who offers " a parcel of extraordinary 
good and fashionable stays of his own making. Slaugh- 
ter Is anxious to suit those that want with extraordinary 
good stays." Another is the shop of John Wallace, " at 
the sign of the Cross Swords, next door to Mrs. Byfield, 
near the Fly Market," who " makes, mends, and grinds 
all sorts of knives, razors, scissors, and penknives, and 

TODD, N. Y. — 9 



I30 

surgeons' instruments," as well as "jacks, locks, keys, 
and stillards." 

At the northwest corner of the Great Dock, " next door 
to the sign of the Leopard," Simon Franks of London 
has a small shop, " where he makes and sells all sorts of 
perukes after the best and newest fashion, and cuts and 
dresses ladies' wigs and towers." 

The strangest shop, however, is that of Joseph Lid- 
dell, " Pewterer," " at the sign of the Platter, at the 
lower end of Wall Street near the Meal Market," who 
sells " pewter ware of all sorts, cannons, six and four 
pounders, and swivel guns, cannon shot, cart and wagon 
boxes," etc. "He will pay you hard money for old 
brass and pewter." 

The undertaker has a most gruesome establishment. 
Coffins, some very ornate in silver and rosewood, stand 
on end in his warerooms. Over a bier at the farther end 
are spread the two parish palls, one of black velvet for 
general use, the other of cloth with a border of white 
silk a foot wide, designed only for unmarried men and 
maidens. On shelves around the sides of the room are 
flannel shrouds, gloves, scarfs, hatbands, and other 
articles of mourning costume. In a tray of lacquer 
work on the counter are the shopman's cards, which in- 
form the public that he " hath a velvet pall, a good hears, 
mourning cloaks, and black hangings for rooms to be let 
at reasonable rates. He hath also for sale all sorts of 
mourning and half mourning, white silk for scarfs and 
hatbands at funerals, with coffins, shrouds, and all sorts 
of burying cloaths for the dead." 

The signs are another striking feature of the streets. 



131 

They swing above every door, not bearing the name of 
the shopkeeper as with us, but the figure of some ani- 
mal or object. The reason is that many of the people 
cannot read, but they can tell a shop by the sign of a 
Cart and Horse, a Bear, or a pair of Crossed Swords. 

Thus the Unicorn and Mortar is a grocer's sign, a 
Chair Wheel of a chairmaker, a Dial of a clockmaker, 
the King's Arms of the Exchange Coffee House, the 
Scotch Arms of another tavern, while over Thomas 
Lepper's " Ordinary," opposite the Merchants' Coffee 
House, swings the sign of the Duke of Cumberland. He 
advertises a tad/c d'Jidte dinner at " half an hour after 
one." The Boston post puts up at the sign of the 
Black Horse in Upper Queen (now Pearl) Street. 
A Bunch of Grapes, Blue Ball, Dolphin, Two Cupids, 
Jamaica Pilot Boat, Rose and Crown, Fighting Cock, 
Spread Eagle, White Swan, the Sun, the Leopard, 
the Bible, are familiar and distinctive signs. 

The coffeehouses, introduced from London, are quite 
numerous, and the favorite resorts of all classes. As a 
resident of the city at this time writes, *' You have all 
manner of news there. You have a good fire which 
you may sit by as long as you please ; you have a dish 
of coffee ; you meet your friends for the transaction of 
business, and all for a penny, if you don't care to spend 
more." 

The Exchange Coffee House is the most exclusive 
and elegant, the Merchants' the most popular and com- 
fortable. Shall we enter ? The floor is bare and sanded, 
the tables and chairs very plain, the prints on the walls 
very high-colored ; but there is a pleasant fire, a perpet- 



132 

ual supply of hot water, and the coffee and tea pots close 
by to keep warm. Here the Boston, Philadelphia, and 
New York newspapers (small two-page affairs filled 
mostly with extracts from London journals) are " taken 




A Coffeehouse. 



in." A gentleman is reading from one to a group of 
interested listeners as we enter : 

'* Last Thursday morning a creature of an uncommon 
size and shape was observed to break through a window 
of a storehouse of this city and jump into the street, 
where was suddenly aiiumber of spectators, who followed 
it till it jumped over several high fences, and at last 
stuck between two houses, where they shot it. Many 
had a curiosity to view it, and say it was seven feet long. 
Most of them say it is a panther, but whence it came, or 
how it got into the storehouse, we are at a loss to know." 



133 




Odd, isn't it, the idea of chasing panthers around on 
lower Broadway and wedging them between buildings 
on Broad Street? It emphasizes the crowning glory of 
the American metropolis that all her wealth, beauty, 
solidity, civilization, 
has been wrested 
from forest and field 
in a little over two 
centuries and a half. 
As we come up to 
Peck Slip there is an alarm of fire, and we step one side 
to see the Newnham fire engines with the volunteer 
firemen go by. The former have been recently in- 
vented, and are force pumps 
worked by long handles, yet 
capable, we are told, of throw- 
ing a stream seventy feet high. 
Each requires twelve men to 
work it. A few years before 
(i 736), the city had built a house for these engines near 
the "watchhouse" in Broad Street. The volunteer 
firemen were appointed by act of Assembly of Septem- 
ber 19, 1738, their 
only salary being that 
they were not obliged 
to serve on juries, nor 
as constables, survey- 
ors of highways, or 
militia. 

In I 798 the city firemen were chartered as the Volun- 
teer Fire Department, and so continued until 1865, when 





134 

the present efficient system of a piid force took its 
place. 

Here at Peck Slip we may take the ferryboat for 
Brooklyn. There is another running from the Fly 
Market at the foot of Maiden Lane, but both land at 
the modern Fulton Street, on the Brooklyn shore. 

A picture of the day shows the dock and ferry house and 
the queer cattle boats with their one mast and spritsail 
forward. The passenger boats are also furnished with 
a sail, but when the wind is contrary it requires as long 
to make the ferry as in 1664, while the sudden gusts 
sweeping down the river sometimes capsize the boat. 
Timid passengers often wait two or three days for a 
favorable wind before venturing over. 

The men of colonial times have perhaps impressed 
you as being stern, cold, formal, unsocial beings, rarely 
unbending from the restraint and dignity of official or 
business life ; but in this you do them an injustice. 
They had their pleasures, the principal ones being thea- 
ter going, card playing, dancing, horse racing, horseback 
riding, sailing, skating, athletic games and sports. There 
was a playhouse in New York as early as October, i 733, 
as wc know by an advertisement of it in the New York 
"Gazette" of that date. A playbill in the ""Weekly 
Post Boy" of March 12, 1750, informs the public that, 
" by His Excellency's permission," " the Historical 
Tragedy of Richard HI. will be presented at the theater 
in Nassau Street, together with a farce called the Bean 
in the Sudds. Tickets to be had of the printer, pit 5jr., 
gallery t^s. To begin precisely at half an hour after 6 
o'clock, and no person to be admitted behind the scenes." 



135 

There were other entertainments, however. Thus in 
1749 John Bonnin advertises his ** Philosophical Optical 
Machine," which was to be exhibited at " eight o'clock in 
the morning and continue showing till nine at night." 
Then there was Punch's company of comedians, and a 
" New Pantomime Entertainment of Grotesque Charac- 
ters in Mr. Holt's Long Room," and a " Concert of 
Vocal and Instrumental Musick at the House of Robert 
Tod, to begin precisely at five o'clock. Tickets at 5.S-." 
The most remarkable, however, was a new electrical 
machine, announced in the " Post Boy " of May 16, i 748, 
which showed ** the most surprising effects or Phe- 
nomena on Electricity of attracting, repelling, and Fle- 
nemics Force, particularly the new way of electryfying 
several persons at the same time, so that Fire shall dart 
from all Parts of their Bodies." 

But these merrymakings, balls, fetes, and stately 
ceremonials passed with the court circle that made 
tliem possible, and a sterner age succeeded. In 1764 
" the times that tried men's souls " were near at hand. 
Let us turn now to consider them and the honorable 
role that New York played in that heroic age. 



XL THROWING OFF THE BRITISH YOKE. 

IN March, 1765, the British Parliament passed the 
Stamp Act, the Httle entering wedge that first 
opened the breach between the American colonies and 
the mother country, England, a breach that was suffered 
to grow and widen through the folly and weakness of 
her king, George III., and the stupidity and wickedness 
of his ministers, until at last England lost her colonies, 
and they came into a free national existence. 

In itself this Stamp Act was not so oppressive a 
measure. Ft simply enacted that all receipts, deeds, 
contracts, and other legal papers, even to marriage 
licenses, should be written or printed on stamped paper, 
which paper should be sold only by the collectors of 
revenue, and should form part of the tax to be collected 
from the colonies. Such a tax is a favorite mode of 
raising revenue to-day with several European govern- 
ments, as well as with our own. 

The difficulty with the colonists was that a principle, 
a right, was involved. In order to put ourselves in their 
place we must stop and consider how^ the Briton of that 
day prized and jealously guarded the British constitu- 
tion. And well he might, for the people had secured 
that noble instrument by a thousand years of struggle 
with kings and nobles. First came Magna Charta, the 

136 



137 

Great Charter, which the barons forced from King John 
in 1215 ; next the Petition of Right in 1628, one of the 
conditions of which was that the king should not make 
" forced loans," that is, tax the people without their 
consent ; third, the Habeas Corpus (*' you may have 
the body") Act, which prevented the king from impris- 
oning a subject without due process of law ; fourth, 
the Bill of Rights of 1689, and, fifth, the Act of Settle- 
ment of 1 700, the last two still further limiting the 
power of the crown. 

There were, of course, other grants, but the above 
are generally considered as the five great pillars of the 
English constitution. Now, the American colonists 
in 1765 considered themselves Britons, and therefore 
heirs to all the rights and privileges of this grand instru- 
ment, and they held that this act of the king and Parlia- 
ment in taxing them without their consent was illegal 
and unconstitutional, and that they should resist it to the 
end ; for if the king could lay this tax without their con- 
sent he could lay others and others, until their property 
was all swept away. 

They were willing, they said, to pay their just share 
of the taxes, but if they did they must send men to 
Parliament to look after their rights and defend their 
interests. Such was the principle at stake. 

Statesmen would have foreseen that the time had 
now come for making America a part of the empire 
and giving her due representation ; but King George 
and his ministers were not statesmen, and they rushed 
blindly on to the disruption of their empire. 

You have read in your histories how the other colo- 



138 

nies resisted this act. New York's action was as spirited 
and determined as any. Hitherto her chief cause of 
complaint liad been that she had not sufficient voice in 
her local government, and that the laws and regulations 
governing her trade were burdensome and intended 
to confine it solely to the mother country ; but here 
was a clear case of the violation of an Englishman's 
constitutional riyhls, and her people determined to have 
nothing to do with the stamped paper. 

The ship Edzvard, bearing the first cargo of it, arrived 
from England on October 23, i 765, and as she anchored 
under the guns of Fort George, though convoyed by a 
frigate and tender, she was greeted with hisses, derisive 
cheers, and menacing gestures by a great crowd of citi- 
zens gathered on the Battery to see her come in, while 
the shipping in the harbor lowered their flags to half- 
mast in token of grief. That night, men stealing by the 
rattle watch went quietly through I he town, posting on 
trees, fences, and buildings handbills on which was writ- 
ten in a bold, free hand : 

" PRO TATRICI. 

'* The first man that distributes or makes use of 

stamped paper let him take care of his house, person, 

and effects. 

" Vox POPULI." 

These handbills produced the effect designed. McEvers, 
the collector, to whom the stamped paper had been con- 
siened, refused to touch it. No one could be found bold 
enough even to receive it into his warehouse or shop. 



139 

At last, in despair, Lieutenant Governor Coldert or- 
dered it stored in the fort until the ist of November, 
the day tlie act was to go into operation, should 
arrive. 

Thursday, the 3 ist of October, came, the day on which 
the governor was to take the oath that would put the 
act into effect. The city awoke in a fever of excitement. 
Bells were tolled ; flags flew at half-mast. " The last 
day of liberty," the Whigs called it. Here and there 
muffled drums were heard beating the funeral march ; 
great numbers of country people streamed in ; there 
were, also, many sailors from the ships ; the townspeople 
joined these, and all paraded the streets, singing patri- 
otic songs, and threatening dire vengeance on any one 
daring to use the stamped paper. In the evening, two 
hundred of the principal merchants engaged in trade 
with England met in the assembly room of the City 
Arms Tavern, made brave and patriotic speeches, and 
passed spirited resolutions " to import no goods from 
England while the Stamp Act remained unrepealed," 
** to countermand all orders for spring goods already 
sent," " to sell no iMiglish goods on commission," and 
" to buy none from strangers that might be sent out." 

At the same meeting a committee of correspondence 
was appointed to urge similar action on the part of other 
cities. Philadelphia merchants did not sign this " non- 
importation agreement," as it was called, until the 14th, 
and Boston merchants not until December 9; so we 
see that both the nonimportation acts and the com- 
mittees of correspondence of the Revolution, of whicli 
so much has been said, had their origin in New York. 



140 

Further, it was agreed at this time to hold a grand mass 
meeting next evening on the common (now City Hall 
Park). What took place then is so vividly described by 
a country lad, E. Carther by name, who came in with 
the others, that we give his letter just as it was written. 

First he informed his parents what the governor did 
on this memorable Stamp Act day: 

** He sent for the soldiers from Tortoise ; he planted 
the cannon against the city ; he fixed the cow horns with 
musket balls. Two cannon were planted against the 
fort gate for fear the mob should break in, loaded with 
grape shot ; he ordered the cannon of the Battery to be 
spiked up for fear the mob should come so far as to 
break out in civil war and knock down the fort. Major 
James had said, * Never fear, I will drive New York with 
500 artillery soldiers.' He [Major James] placed sol- 
diers at the Gaol to prevent the mob letting out the 
prisoners. 

"He ordered 15 artillery soldiers at his house near 
the Coladge [Columbia College], where Black Sam for- 
merly dwelt, and the rest of the soldiers he kept within 
the fort ready for an engagement." 

In the evening the citizens began to muster about the 
streets. 

" About seven in the evening I heard a great Hozaing 
near the Broadway. I ran that way with a number of 
others when the mob first began. They had an ephogy 
[effigy] of the Governor made of paper which sat on an 
old chair that a seaman carried on his head. The mob 
went from the Fields down the Fly [Pearl Street] Hoza- 
ing at every corner with amazing sight of candles. The 



141 



mob went from there to Mr. McEvers who was ap- 
pointed for Stamp master in London. Since he did not 
accept it they honored him with three cheers. From 
thence they went to the Fort that the Governor might see 
his ephogy if he dare show his face. The mob gave seven 
Hozas and threatened the officer upon the wall. They 
jeered Major 
James for say- 
ing he could 
drive New 
York with 500 
men. Themob 
had assurance 
enough to 
break open 
the Gover- 
nor's coach 
house, and 
took his coach 
from under the 
muzzles of his 
cannon. They 
put the eph- 
ogy upon the coach, one sat up for coachman with the 
whip in his hand, whilst others drawed it about the town, 
down to the Coffee house, and the Merchants' Exchange." 

After speeches by their leaders, they turned and 
marched back to the fort " with about 500 or 600 can- 
dles to alight them." 

" I ran down to the fort to hear what they said. As 
the mob came down it made a beautiful appearance, and 




142 

as soon as Major James saw them I heard him say from 
off the walls: * Here they come by.' — As soon as the 
mob saw the fort they gave three cheers, and came 
down to it. They went under the cannon which was 
planted against them with grape shot. They bid a 
soldier upon the walls to tell the 'rebel drummer' or 
Major James to give orders to fire. They placed the 
gallows against the fort gate, and took clubs and beat 
against it, and then gave three Hozas in defiance. They 
then concluded to burn the ephogy, and the Governor's 
coach in the Bowling Green before their eyes." 

After burning the coach, the people, mad with excite- 
ment, went to Major James's house and destroyed his 
furniture, except " one red silk curtain and the colors of 
the royal regiment," which they carried off in triumph. 

Our letter writer continues : " The third day they was 
resolved to have the Governor dead or alive. The fort 
got up the fascines in order for battle, and the mob 
began before dark. The Governor sent for his Council 
which held about two hours whilst thousands stood by 
ready for the word. The Governor consented, and 
promised faithfully to have nothing to do with the 
stamps, and that he would send them back to London 
b}^ Captain Davis of the Edivard.'' 

This account is in the main correct. At the people's 
demand the governor delivered the stamped paper to the 
mayor and aldermen, who deposited it in the City Hall, 
and no further attempt was made to enforce the odious 
tax in New York. The next spring, i 766, a new min- 
istry, with the great statesman William Pitt at its head, 
came into power, and the obnoxious law was repealed, 



H3 

although ParHament still asserted its right to tax the 
colonies. 

The Stamp Act served to separate men into two 
parties, and to give these body and form. From this 
time until the open rupture in i 775, they confronted eacli 
other in the city, the "Tory,' '"Royalist," or "minis- 
terial " party, as it was variously called, on one side, and 
the " Whig," " patriot," or " rebel " party on the other. 
Each party had, of course, its leaders. First on the Roy- 
alist side was Lieutenant Governor Golden, who, until 
the newly appointed governor. Sir Henry Moore, should 
arrive, was clothed with supreme authority. Golden was 
eighty years of age at this time, a man of stanch loy- 
alty, but stubborn, and lacking in tact and discernment. 
Next to him was General Thomas Gage, whom the 
Whig newspapers called irreverently " Tom Gage," the 
commander in chief of the British forces in America, 
whose large, double house stood on the present site of 
Nos. ^'] and 69 Broadway. There was Major Thomas 
James, commander of the regiment of artillery and owner 
of the beautiful country seat " Vauxhall," on the banks 
of the Hudson near the foot of the present Ghambers 
Street, and greatly disliked by the patriots for his arro- 
gance an(i boastful threats. Other leaders were the 
Rev. Dr. Samuel Auchmuty, rector of Trinity Ghurch ; 
the Rev. Dr. Myles Gooper, president of King's Gollege, 
later banished for his Tory sentiments and pamphlets ; 
John Antill, postmaster ; Daniel Horsmanden, chief jus- 
tice of the province ; Samuel Bayard, assistant secretary ; 
Golonel William Bayard, the great merchant; John 
Harris Gruger, treasurer of the city; John Griffiths, 



144 

master of the port ; Thomas Buchanan, to whom later 
the tea ships were consigned ; and many others, office- 
holders or those who received in some way largess from 
the king. 

The patriots, on the other hand, were men without 
office or the hope of it, since their very acts disbarred 
them. Chief among them in boldness and energy was 
Isaac Sears, a merchant in the West India trade. 
John Lamb, an optician by trade, who later became 
a colonel in the Revolutionary army, was equally prom- 
inent. There was Alexander McDougall, a Scotchman 
by birth, and later a major general on the patriot side ; 
John Morin Scott, an eminent lawyer; and Marinus 
Willett, who had marched with Abercrombie to Lake 
George and Ticonderoga, with Bradstreet to Fort Fron- 
tenac, and who later became a lieutenant colonel in the 
New York line, and in 1807 mayor of New York. 

Sir Henry Moore arrived toward the close of 1765, 
and at once ordered a change of policy. He was a very 
different man from the acting governor, Colden, being- 
bland, persuasive, soft-voiced, shrewd, and tactful. He 
" came as a friend among friends," he said, " and not to a 
revolted province ; " and he gave orders to dismantle the 
fort and scatter the soldiers, while he set about healing 
the wounds his predecessor had made. Very soon a 
much better feeling existed, although the two parties 
still stood to their arms and kept a wary eye upon each 
other. An incident that occurred during the summer 
of 1766 impressed this forcibly on the governor's mind. 

The Sons of Liberty, a patriotic society of the day, 
erected a "liberty pole" on June 4, 1766, the king's 



145 

birthday, In honor of the repeal of the Stamp Act, and 
further celebrated the day with firing of cannon, a grand 
barbecue on the common, and bonfires in the evening. 
The flag that was later flung from the pole bore the 
words: "The King, Pitt, Liberty." Now, the repeal of 




the Stamp Act had greatly angered the soldiers and 
Tories, who regarded it as a victory for the people, 
and this flag flaunting in their faces irritated them beyond 
endurance ; they therefore determined to destroy it, and 
did so on the loth of August by cutting down the pole 
itself. The Sons of Liberty raised it again, and again 
the soldiers leveled it. A third was quickly raised, and 
so close a watch kept upon it that it was not until the 
night of the i8th of March, 1767, that the soldiers suc- 
ceeded in felling it. The patriots raised a fourth, and 
this time secured it with iron bands. The soldiers made 

TODD, N. Y. — 10 



146 

two desperate attacks upon it, but were twice repulsed 
by the patriots, until at length, to keep the peace, Gov- 
ernor Moore interposed, and ordered the soldiers to 
cease their attempts. The latter now remained quiet 
until over three years had elapsed, and then one night 
sallied out against the pole, and cutting it down, piled 
the fragments against the door of Montague's Tavern, 
where the Sons of Liberty held their meetings. 

This was adding insult to injury. The next day 
nearly the whole city, we are told, met on the common 
and passed resolutions " that all soldiers below the rank 
of orderly who appeared armed on the streets should be 
deemed disturbers of the peace, and be liable to arrest, 
together with all those found out of their barracks after 
roll call." 

The soldiers met this by writing an insulting placard, 
which they posted throughout the city. Three of them 
were caught in the act by two stalwart Sons of Liberty, 
Isaac Sears and Walter Quackenbos, who attempted to 
take them as prisoners to the mayor's office, but were 
discovered by a party of soldiers from the lower bar- 
racks, who rushed to the rescue. But the Liberty Boys 
were also on the alert, and hurrying to the aid of their 
comrades, armed with canes, sticks, stones, bludgeons, 
and knives, a brisk battle was fought, in which the sol- 
diers were worsted — not, however, until one patriot had 
been thrust through with a bayonet, and several others 
wounded. The next day, the soldiers, smarting under 
a sense of defeat, renewed the attack, first upon a 
woman who was going to market, then upon a party of 
sailors passing through the streets, one of whom, an old 



147 

man, was stabbed with a bayonet and fell. Being 
driven off, they renewed the attack in the afternoon, and 
were again repulsed. This two days' battle with the 
military began January i8, 1770. The Boston massacre, 
in which it has been said the first blood spilled in the 
Revolution was shed, occurred March 5, 1770, or nearly 
two months later. 

We have all read of the famous *' Boston Tea Party " 
of December 16, 1773, following the duty laid upon tea 
by Parliament. New York had hers also, although it 
did not take place until some three months later, for the 
reason that the tea ship destined for New York was 
about three months overdue, having been driven out of 
her course by a storm. This first tea ship, the Nancy, 
was due in New York November 25, 1773, and the 
" Mohawks," an order similar to that which destroyed 
the tea in Boston, had made ready to receive her; at the 
same time the Sons of Liberty, which, under Governor 
Moore's pacific reign, had nearly died out, was revived 
and panoplied for the fray. 

Sir William Tryon, a man of very different character, 
haughty, cruel, remorseless, had succeeded Moore in 
I 77 I, and by his words and manner quickly excited a 
feeling of resistance throughout the province. At last, 
on April 18, 1774, the long-expected tea ship was re- 
ported, and the Mohawks made ready to receive her. 
She had fallen in with a cyclone on the voyage, her cap- 
tain, Lockyer, reported, had lost her mizzenmast and an 
anchor, sprung her maintopmast, and sustained other 
injuries. As " Holt's Journal " of April 21 said: 

" Ever since her departure from Europe she has met 



148 

with a continued succession of misfortunes, having on 
board something worse than a Jonah, which, after being 
long tossed on the tempestuous ocean, it is hoped, Hke 
him, will be thrown back upon the place from whence it 
came. May it preach a lesson there as useful as the 
preaching of Jonah was to the Ninevites." 

In this spirit the people received the tea which Par- 
liament had decided to tax in order, as Lord North 
observed, '* to try the question with America." 

By agreement with the Sons of Liberty the New York 
pilots refused to bring the Nancy farther than Sandy 
Hook. There she was boarded by a committee of the 
Sons, who took possession of her boats, that her crew 
might not escape, and thus prevent her being sent back 
to England, which had been determined on. Lockyer 
consented to go back, and was allowed to come up to the 
city and see his consignee, but was not permitted to ap- 
proach the customhouse, lest he should enter his vessel. 

Before he could sail, however, the London, Captain 
Chambers, was reported. She, too, was boarded at 
Sandy Hook by the Liberty Boys ; but as her captain 
positively declared he had no tea on board, he was 
allowed to come up to his dock. However, the com- 
mittee had received private advices from Philadelphia 
that tea was on board, and as the London swung into 
her berth, about four in the afternoon, the whole com- 
mittee boarded her and ordered the hatches opened, 
saying they were certain that she carried tea, and as- 
suring Captain Chambers that they were ready to open 
every package in the cargo in order to find it ; where- 
upon the captain, seeing concealment to be impossible, 



149 

confessed that he had eigliteen chests on board. Upon 
this the committee invited him to the great pubHc room 
of Fraunces's Tavern to dehberate on the matter. They 
decided " to communicate the whole sense of the mat- 
ter to the people, who were convened near the ship, 
which was accordingly done." The Mohaw^ks w^ere pre- 
pared to do their duty under cover of darkness, but the 




f'-:^^:M.,-'^ '"^K'X^i 



r 1 



lift XP^^'^ 



^;■ !M;'.;i: 



! •' 




Fraunces's Tavern. 

people were so impatient that before night fell a num- 
ber of them boarded the ship, took out the tea which 
was at hand, broke the cases, and emptied their contents 
into the river, without doing any harm to the ship or 
cargo. Several persons of reputation were placed below 
to keep tally, and about the companionway to prevent 
ill-disposed persons from going below the deck. 

At ten o'clock the people all dispersed in good order, 
but in great w^ath with the captain ; and it was not 
without some risk of his life that he escaped. 



150 

By this time Captain Lockyer was able to fix the 
hour of departure for his return voyai^e ; the people 
were informed of it and invited to meet on tlie dock- 
whence he was to depart, and give him an idea of the 
feeling among them in regard to tlie taxed tea. He was 
to leave on Saturday morning at nine o'clock. " The 
bells will give notice about an hour before he embarks 
from Murray's Wharf," said the placards that were 
posted all over the city. As nine o'clock struck, the 
committee waited on him at his lodgings at the coffee- 
house, and escorted him to its balcony, that he might see 
the people and be seen by them. As he appeared, a 
band struck up " God Save the King," and the people 
raised a great shout. Then a procession was formed 
with the captain and committee at its head, and to the 
sound of martial music moved down Wall Street to 
Murray's Wharf, where a small sloop lay ready to take 
the captain to his ship down in the lower bay. The 
captain and the committee boarded this sloop. Cap- 
tain Chambers, finding New York pretty warm for him, 
also took passage. Then the little craft spread sail and 
moved down harbor, while the city bells rang for joy, the 
ship.", in the port flaunted their gayest colors, the much- 
fought-for liberty pole on the common flamed with 
colors to its peak, and cannon planted at its base thun- 
dered forth the triumph of the people. 



XII. THE BATTLE OF LONG ISLAND. 

NEW YORK was the theater of some important 
events in the War of the Revolution. On receiv- 
ing news of the battle of Lexington four days after 
the event, Sunday, April 23, 1775, the patriot leaders 
warned the people, *' who assembled, and n(3t being able 
to secure the key of the arsenal [in the City Hall], where 
the colony's arms were kept, forced open the door and 
took six hundred muskets, with bayonets and cartridge 
boxes filled with ball cartridges." These arms were dis- 
tributed among the more active citizens, who formed 
themselves into a volunteer corps and assumed the 
government of the city. 

Bodies of men then went to the customhouse, de- 
manded the keys, and took possession of the public 
stores contained therein. Next the patriots turned 
their attention to two vessels at the dock about to 
sail for Boston with supplies for General Gage's troops, 
Isaac Sears and John Lamb, with their Liberty Boys, 
boarding them, and speedily unloading the cargoes, 
valued at eighty thousand dollars. No resistance was 
offered by the garrison, which numbered but one hun- 
dred regulars, under command of Major Isaac Ham- 
ilton. Governor Tryon was in England. When Mon- 
day came and the merchants and artisans arrived at their 



152 

shops and stores, they found the regular authority over- 
turned and the city in the hands of the Sons of Liberty. 
All business was stopped ; bodies of armed men patrolled 
the streets. In Paris, anarchy would have followed ; 
but in New York eight days after the overthrow (May i) 
the people quietly elected a committee of one hundred 
to govern them until the Continental Congress, which 
was soon to meet in Philadelphia, should constitute 
other authority. 

There was a great demonstration when, on May 7, 
1775, the delegates from Massachusetts and Connecticut 
passed through the city on their way to this Continen- 
tal Congress at Philadelphia, and a second, on June 25, 
1775, when Washington, the newly appointed com- 
mander in chief of the army, rode through on his way 
to take command of the forces investing Boston. By a 
strange coincidence Governor Tryon arrived the same 
evening from England, direct from personal interviews 
with the king and ministry. 

Under the call of Congress for troops four regiments 
were raised in New York alone. A few small skir- 
mishes occurred between them and the Asia and other 
British guard ships in the harbor, but New York saw no 
actual war until in July, 1776, Sir William Howe, with 
a large fleet and an army of veteran troops, arrived from 
Halifax to invest and capture the city. This was the 
same general and army, you will remember, that had 
been driven out of Boston by the Continentals the spring 
before, added to by new regiments from England. 
Washington and Putnam had been in New York all 
summer, fortifying. There was a cordon of earthworkg 



153 

across the lower part of the island, and there were bar- 
ricades in the streets, and strong forts on Brooklyn and 
Columbia Heights, on the Long Island shore. The 
weakness of the position lay in the fact that the enemy, 
with his fleet, could ascend either the East River or 
the Hudson and cover the landing of his army with its 
guns. Howe, however, did not avail himself of this 
advantage, but landed his army at various points along 
the curving shores of Gravesend Bay, between Coney 
Island and the present Fort Hamilton, and attacked the 
American army, which Washington had advanced to 
defend Brooklyn Heights. 

As the ground fought and marched over in the battle 
that ensued is all within the limits of the present borough 
of Brooklyn, it will be interesting to consider that battle 
in detail. No doubt you have ridden on your wheels 
through the pleasant shades of Prospect Park, or 
skimmed over the smooth surface of Flatbush Avenue 
to the rural hamlet of Flatlands, or taken the Ocean 
Parkway path to the sea, or Eighteenth Avenue, that 
runs to Bath Beach, or F'ort Hamilton Avenue, skirting 
the southern border of Greenwood Cemetery, to Fort 
Hamilton ; again, perhaps you have ridden out by the 
Eastern Boulevard and the roads leading from it east- 
ward to the old Jamaica Plank Road, or from the ter- 
raced heights of Washington Park have looked down on 
the mighty city below, — if you have, you are familiar 
with the battle ground of August 27, 1776. 

Let us see first where the American army was posted. 
If you draw a line straight across from the present Navy 
Yard to Gowanus Canal the region west and southwest 




r-i American Forces 
■■ British Forces 



L.L.POATES, N.Y. 



T3 

C 

C 

o 



-«— • 

CQ 



c 



(154) 



155 

is a peninsula ending in a sharp point called Red Hook, 
Gowanus Creek and marsh inclosing it on one side, and 
the Bay of the Wallabout on the other. The country then 
was mostly forest and farm. Gowanus Canal, now the 
center of business and trade, was then a sluggish creek 
flowing through a wide marsh. Columbia and Brooklyn 
Heights, the highest points in this peninsula, commanded 
New York, and on them General Lee and Lord Stirling 
had erected two forts, Stirling and the Citadel. When 
Putnam came he decided to throw a chain of forts, re- 
doubts, and trenches from Gowanus Creek quite across 
the neck to the Wallabout. First, and nearest Gowanus, 
was Fort Box, on or near the present line of Pacific Street, 
a short distance above Bond. Next, and three hundred 




Washington Park (Site of Fort Putnam). 



156 

yards west, was Fort Greene, star-shaped, rrtoliriting six 
guns, and lying between the present State and Scher- 
merhorn streets. Still farther to the left was the " oblong 
redoubt," on the corner of the present De Kalb and 
Hudson avenues. Fort Putnam, star-shaped, mount- 
ing five guns, came next, its site still preserved in beau- 
tiful Washington Park. Below it, near the bay, was 
the " redoubt on the left," standing in the middle of the 
present Cumberland Street, between Willoughby Street 
and Myrtle Avenue. 

If we take our station on the water tower near the main 
entrance to Prospect Park we can get a bird's-eye view 
of the whole battle ground. Before us, on the south, 
lies the ''great plain," which in 1776 was covered with 
farm and forest, with three smiling villages on its bosom, 
— New Utrecht, Gravesend, and Flatbush, — whose po- 
sition you can readily find on the map. The chain of 
hills, then called the Heights of Guana, which runs 
from the bay shore to East New York through Green- 
wood Cemetery and Prospect Park, was covered with 
dense forest and scrub impassable to an army. South 
Brooklyn was a swamp. Gowanus Creek showed great 
mills whose wheels were moved by the ebb and flow of 
the tides. Second, Third, and Fourth avenues were a 
morass, as was the whole region in that neighborhood, 
now covered with blocks of buildings. 

At the north was the King's Highway, winding up the 
hill from Fulton Ferry, passing the Brooklyn church and 
hamlet, and continuing on, skirting the northern base of 
the hills, to Bedford and Jamaica. This road threw off 
branches leading to the villages in the plain — first, the 



157 

" Coast Road," which skirted the shore quite to the 
Narrows ; second, the road to Flatbush, about a mile and 
a half beyond the American works ; and, third, three 
quarters of a mile farther on, the road from Bedford to 
Flatbush. These roads reached the plain by gaps in 
the Heights of Guana, and were the only means by 
which an enemy in the plain could reach the American 
line, except that at the extreme left, four miles away, 
where the King's Highway passed through the range, 
was Jamaica Pass, at the present entrance to the Ceme- 
tery of the Evergreens. 

On the Coast Road, hard by the Red Lion Tavern, a 
narrow lane called Martense Lane branched off to the left, 
and skirting the southern boundary line of the present 
Greenwood, connected with the roads on the plain. 
The Heights of Guana formed the American outer line 
of defense or skirmish line. The only one of the gaps 
defended by fieldworks was the Flatbush Pass, within 
the present limits of Prospect Park. This pass was de- 
fended by two batteries — a crescent-shaped redoubt that 
extended across the main street of Flatbush just within 
the village, and a smaller one at Valley Grove to guard 
the Port Road, which ran down to the East River along 
the present line of First Street. 

Swarming like ants upon these fortifications, march- 
ing through the roads, drilling on parade, had been all 
summer perhaps the oddest, most incongruous army 
ever recruited since Falstaff's day. There were the 
green hunting shirts and leggings of the Marylanders, the 
dark-blue coats with red facings of the Delaware militia, 
the tow frocks and tarnished scarlet regimentals of the 



158 

Connecticut troops. There were the New Jersey rifle- 
men, some in short red coats and striped trousers, some 
in blue coats, with leathern breeches ending in blue yarn 
stockings, and heavy shoes with brass buckles. Here 
was a Pennsylvania regiment in variegated costume: 
one company clad in brown coats faced with white and 
adorned with huge metal buttons ; another showing blue 
coats faced with red ; a third, brown coats faced with buff. 
Many from the backwoods wore fringed hunting shirts 
and leggings. Some marched and fought in their shirt 
sleeves. 

The Virginians aroused envy by the superior quality 
of their uniform — white frocks adorned with ruffles at 
neck, wrists, and elbows, black, broad-brimmed slouch 
hats, black stocks, and hair in long queues. They were 
called the dandies of the army. 

The arms of this impromptu host were quite as diverse 
and incongruous as its uniforms. There were the shot- 
gun and old " king's arm " of the Puritans, the long 
" goose gun " of the New York Dutchmen, the musket 
of the Pennsylvanians, the deer-slaying rifles of the New 
Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia riflemen. Very few of 
them were furnished with bayonets or sufficient ammu- 
nition. 

The total number of available men at Washington's 
command at this crisis was nineteen thousand, organized 
in five divisions, the division commanders being Put- 
nam, Heath, Spencer, Sullivan, and Greene, with Knox 
commanding the artillery. Save Putnam and Spencer, 
these commanders had had very little military training; 
some of the subordinate ofticers were mere boys in 



159 

years. Alexander Hamilton, later the greatest states- 
man of his time, who commanded a battery in Knox's 
division, was but nineteen. Aaron Burr, with whom 
his fate was later so interwoven, an aide on General 
Putnam's staff, was a youth of twenty, while Nicholas 
Fish, Brigadier General Scott's brigade major, was but 
eighteen. 

A gallant and effective arm of the patriot force should 
be mentioned — the motley fleet of swift schooners, 
sloops, periaguas, row galleys, and whaleboats, com- 
manded by Lieutenant Colonel Benjamin Tupper, which 
patrolled the harbor, rivers, and sound, and picked up 
deserters, spies, provision boats, and news of the enemy's 
movements with the greatest dispatch and impartiality. 
„ When we consider the opposing army we wonder at 
the tenlerity of the patriots in attempting to oppose it. 
This army was composed mainly of regular soldiers — 
men trained to the profession of arms, veterans who had 
been under fire. There was Gage's Boston garrison, 
seasoned veterans from the West Indies, the Peninsula, 
Gibraltar, and other strongholds, Scotch who had won 
renown in a seven years' war, and Hessians whose trade 
it was to fight. Then the officers were men trained in 
the best military schools of Europe, lieutenant generals, 
major generals, brigadier generals — Howe and Clinton 
and Percy and Cornwallis, Mathews, Pigot, Grant, 
Robertson, Jones, Vaughan, Agnew, Leslie, Cleveland, 
Smith, and Erskine ; in numbers there were twenty-three 
thousand Englishmen and eight thousand Hessians, 
thirty-one thousand men against the patriots' nineteen 
thousand; and besides this, a fleet of four hundred war 



i6o 

ships and transports, among the former twenty frigates 
and ten ships of the Hne. 

It was on the 29th of June that Lord Howe arrived. 
Nine days after, July 8, he threw nine thousand men 
ashore and occupied Staten Island. A few days later 
his brother. Admiral Howe, arrived with the rest of his 
forces-^English regiments just sent out, and the Hes- 
sians whom King George had hired from the Landgrave 
of Hesse and other petty German rulers. 

On the 1 2th of July the British frigates Rose and 
PJioenix ran past the batteries, and sailed up the Hud- 
son as farasHaverstraw^, to encourage the Tories of West- 
chester County and open communication with General 
Carleton, who was marching south from Canada by way 
of Lake Champlain to attack the Americans in the rear. 

Lord Howe was a just and humane man, whose sym- 
pathies were with the Americans. He had been told 
by King George to offer pardon to all " rebels," as he 
termed them, who would submit. Howe, therefore, 
before offering battle, desired to meet the leaders and 
confer with them. Accordingly, on July 14, he sent 
an aide in a barge, with a letter addressed to *' Mr. 
Washington." Tupper's alert whaleboats captured the 
barge in midharbor, and held it while they sent a mes- 
senger to headquarters to know if Washington would 
receive it. In reply General Knox and Colonel Reed, 
Washington's adjutant general, came down to confer 
with the officer. 

He received them courteously. '* I have a letter," 
said he, ** for Mr. Washijigton." "We have no per- 
son of that name in our army," replied Colonel Reed. 



i6i 

** Will you not look at the address?" persisted the 
officer. " No, sir," replied Reed ; " I cannot receive that 
letter." " I am sorry," said the envoy, and bowing, 
returned to the fleet. 

Something more than personal vanity or military 
etiquette was involved here. For Howe to have ad- 
dressed Washington as " General" would have been to 
acknowledge the authority of the Continental Congress, 
which had created him one. But this authority King 
George denied. According to his view, the Americans 
were simply rebellious subjects, liable by military usage 
and the law of nations to be summarily executed for 
treason if taken in arms. 

For Washington, on the other hand, to have re- 
ceived the letter would have been to admit the king's 
contention. 

A personal interview between Washington and Colo- 
nel Patterson, representing General Howe, was later 
arranged at the Kennedy mansion. 

Colonel Patterson apologized for the address on the 
former letter, and produced another bearing the inscrip- 
tion, '' George Washington, Esq., etc., etc., etc.," which, 
as it implied everything, General Howe hoped would be 
satisfactory. *' True," replied Washington, '' but it also 
implies anything ; " and he declined to receive any letter 
not bearing his proper title. Colonel Patterson then 
said that the king desired to conciliate his American 
subjects and had given Lord Howe and his brother. 
Admiral Howe, power to offer pardon to all who would 
lay down their arms. 

To this Washington replied that the Americans, hav- 

TODD, N. v. — II 



1 62 

ing done no wroni^, could accept no pardons. " They 
had but taken up arms to maintain their rights as Eng- 
Hshmen." 

Finding his offers of peace spurned, Howe now pro- 
ceeded to move against the American army by way of 
Long Island, although a large force was sent to attack 
Bergen, Elizabethport, and Perth Amboy, on the New 
Jersey shore. Twenty-four thousand men were detailed 
for the attack on Long Island. 

On the night of August 22, 1776, the advance guard 
of this force landed on the shores of Gravesend Bay, 
between the present village of Bath Beacli and Coney 
Island. At nine next morning four thousand light in- 
fantry crossed in flatboats from Staten Island, convoyed 
by the Rainbow and other men-of-war, and landed at 
what is now Fort Hamilton. An hour later a second 
division, of British and Hessians, entered boats, and row- 
ing in regular ranks, landed at the bend of Gravesend 
Bay, at or near Bath Beach. Fifteen thousand men were 
ashore by noon, and spreading over Gravesend and New 
Utrecht plains under cover of the guns of the fleet. 

Let us cross the East River with this boatload of 
soldiers which Washington is hurrying over to rcenforce 
his brave fellows on the heights. The only means of 
propelling boats at this time, you remember, are oars 
and sails. Brooklyn Heif^hts rise before us in their 
natural outlines, uncrowned by buildings. There is a 
village at the ferr}', there are a few farmhouses on the 
slopes, and the two noble mansions of Phillip and 
Robert Livingston on Columbia Heights, but neither 
city nor town. 



i63 

We will resume our stand on Reservoir Hill and view 
the position of the contending armies. The British 
hold the plain as far east as Flatbush and Flatlands. 
There are twenty -one thousand men there, for a third 
division of six thousand men has reenforced the fifteen 
thousand men that first landed. The Hessians and re- 
serves are massed yonder at Flatbush, facing the pass, 
the main body, under Clinton and Percy, at Flatlands, 
two miles soutli, while Grant, with two brigades at Bath 
and New Utrecht, holds the Coast Road. The ex- 
treme right of the Americans, covering New Utrecht 
and the Martense Lane, is held by General Lord Stirling 
with his riflemen and Parsons's Connecticut troops. Gen- 
eral Sullivan's division holds the center and extreme 
right, his regiments being stretched along the brow of 
the range for two miles on each side of the Flatbush 
Pass, and holding it. Meeting them on their left, Colo- 
nel Miles's Pennsylvania riflemen and some Connecticut 
levies take up the line and carry it east beyond Bedford 
Pass, but stop short of Jamaica Pass, leaving the latter 
unguarded — a grave mistake, by some charged to Gen- 
eral Sullivan and by others to General Putnam. The 
whole number of American troops on this their outer 
line does not exceed twenty-eight hundred men, and in 
all there are barely eight thousand men, Washington 
not daring to leave his defenses on the New York side 
unmanned. 

General Israel Putnam succeeded General Sullivan 
as commander in chief the day before, Washington 
remaining in New York. Putnam was a veteran of the 
French and Indian wars, a good fighter and strict dis- 



164 

ciplinarian, who had done excellent service at Bunker 
Hill a few months before. He, with the main body, 
held the inner or fortified line, whence it was thought he 
could quickly send aid to any part of the outer line when 
hard pressed. 

The Tories promptly conveyed to Howe news that the 
Jamaica Pass had been left unguarded and was patrolled 
only by a few vedettes, and the latter's plan of battle was 
quickly formed, viz., to gain this pass quietly, march 
through it, turn the American left and gain the rear 
undetected, in which event the battle w^ould be won. 
Grant, accordingly, was given orders to make a feint on 
Stirling on the morning of the 27th, at the Red Lion 
Tavern, a famous hostelry of that day, standing at the 
point where Martense Lane left the Coast Road, but by 
no means to bring on a serious battle until he should 
hear Clinton's guns in the American rear. De Heister 
and Knyphausen, commanding the Hessians, were given 
orders to attack Flatbush Pass at the same time, w-hile 
Clinton and Percy were to steal around the American 
left w^ith the entire right wing, gain Jamaica Pass, and 
double up the outer line on itself and the main body. 
This plan was carried out with perfect success. 

At evening gun fire on the night of the 26th the troops 
of Clinton, Percy, and Cornwallis left their camp at 
Flatlands, with the fires still burning in order to deceive 
the Americans, and began their march " across the 
country through the new lots toward Jamaica Pass," as 
Lord Howe wrote in his report. 

At the front were three Flatbush Tories as guides; 
then came Clinton with the light dragoons and a bri- 



1 65 

gade of light infantry ; then Cornwallis and the reserves, 
with fourteen pieces of hght artihery ; then Lords Howe 
and Percy. This force toiled on in the darkness along 
the sandy road from Flatlands as far as Shoemakers 
Creek, and then, the better to escape detection, crossed 
over through the fields to the Jamaica Road, striking 
it at William Howard's Halfway House, a few yards 
southeast of the pass. 

Leaving his main army in the fields, Howe, with his 
aids and a small bodyguard, went forward, and the 
former, with a civilian's hat on and a camlet cloak drawn 
over his uniform, entered the tavern and ordered a drink. 

** Have you joined the association? " he asked of the 
tavernkeeper. 

" Yes," replied Howard. 

*' That's all very well ; stick to your colors ; but now 
you are my prisoner and must lead me across these 
hills, out of the way of the rebels, the nearest way to 
Gowanus," was the reply. 

Howard led them around the pass by a bridle path 
that traversed what is now Evergreen Cemetery, and 
gained the Jamaica Road in the rear of the pass. 
They found the pass unguarded, and at once sent w^ord 
to Clinton to hurry forward with the main body, which 
had been left in the fields, and occupy it. 

But where was the vedette that had been set to patrol 
the pass? On this particular night it consisted of five 
young American officers of undoubted bravery and 
patriotism, who had volunteered for the perilous work 
— Van Wagener (one of the heroes of Quebec), Troup, 
Dunscomb, Hoogland, and Gilliland. Their orders 



i66 

were to patrol the pass and send news of the advance 
of tlie foe. But they erred from excess of zeal: not 
dreamini^ that the enemy would advance tlirrucrh the 
fields, they went forward on the road, the quicker to 
discover a possible advance, and the British slipped in 
between and captured them. 

The young men were at once hurried into the pres- 
ence of Clinton, who questioned them closely as to the 
troops, the forts, and the positions of the Americans; 
but they refused to answer. 

" Under other circumstances," said Dunseomb, " you 
would not dare insult us in this manner." 

Clinton, angered, called him an " impudent rebel," 
and threatened to hang him. 

" No, you will not," replied Dunseomb, " for Wash- 
ington can hang man for man." 

The army now took breakfast and then hurried on 
down the King's Highway to Bedford, where they ar- 
rived about half-past eight in the morning. At this 
point they were well in the rear of the American outer 
line, about half a mile distant from it, and a mile and a 
half from Putnam's position. They could hear the 
thunder of De Heister's guns, now hotly engaged with 
Sullivan for possession of the Flatbush Pass. 

In a short time they were discovered by Miles, who 
now found himself attacked h\' them in the lear, while 
cannonading down near the Red Lion Tavern told that 
Grant had obeyed orders and was engaging Stirling in 
that quarter. 

The patriots saw that they were caught in a trap, 
between two fires, and cut ofT from their supports. A 



1 67 

terrible liand-to-hand conflict of two hours now ensued 
in the woods and thickets, between Miles's and Sullivan's 
men on the one side and the British and Hessians, who, 
as we have seen, had penned them up between them — 
a fight with bayonet and sword and clubbed musket 
and branches rent from the trees; a struggle to the 
death, no quarter being asked or given. No supports 
were sent them by Putnam, for he knew not where to 
send, his whole line being engaged. The unequal com- 
bat could not long continue, however, and about noon 
Sullivan's and Miles's men broke and fled into the woods, 
A few gaineci the fortified line, but most of them were 
killed or taken prisoners. 

Meantime the honors of the day had been won by 
Stirling, Parsons, and the sturdy troops of the Connect- 
icut, Delaware, and Maryland lines. 

On the night before the attack, August 26, Grant 
advanced by both the Coast Road and Martense Lane as 
ordered, and by midnight reached the vicinity of the Red 
Lion Tavern, where he came upon a guard of Ameri- 
cans under Major Bird, who at once sent word to Put- 
nam. The latter ordered Stirling to check them, and 
that general, placing himself at the head of Haslet's 
Delaware battalion and Smallwood's Maryland regiment, 
hurried to the spot, closely followed by General Parsons, 
with Hunt's Connecticut regiment of two hundred and 
fifty men. A full half mile this side of the Red Lion 
Tavern they met Colonel Atlee's regiment retiring before 
the British column, whose front could be seen in the dim 
light of the dawn, a little in advance of the present en- 
trance to Greenwood. Grant now formed line of battle 



1 68 

across the Coast Road (in the vicinity of the present 
Thirty-eijrhth and Thirty-ninth streets, between Second 
and Third avenues), from the marsli on the east to the 
crest of the hills that now form the westerr^ boundary of 
Greenwood. 

Stirling took post on the slopes of the hills between 
Eighteenth and Twentieth streets, a little to the north- 
west of the present Battle Hill in Greenwood, a com- 
pany of riflemen being posted on the edge of the woods 
and along a ledge at the foot of the hill. A number of 
the latter climbed the trees, and from that coign of van- 
tage picked off the British officers as they advanced. One 
huge Marylander was seen to kill Major Grant and another 
officer in this way, when he was discovered, and a whole 
platoon was ordered to advance and fire into the tree ; at 
its fire he fell to the ground, pierced by a dozen bullets. 

A Maryland regiment was posted on a low, wooded 
hill beside the Coast Road, at about the foot of the pres- 
ent Twenty-third Street. Here, awaiting attack, Stirling 
made a stirring address to his troops, reminding them 
that a few months before he had heard this same 
Major Grant openly boast in the British Parliament that 
the Americans could not fight, and that with five thou- 
sand men '* he could march from one end of the continent 
to the other." 

Pointing to the head of Gravesend Bay, he continued : 
"Grant may have his five thousand men now; we are 
not so many, but I think we are enough to prevent his 
getting farther than that mill pond." 

In reality Grant had seven thousand men, Stirling 
sixteen hundred. 



169 

For two hours the grim lines faced each other, Grant, 
as we have seen, having positive orders not to force a 
battle until he heard the guns of the flanking column in 
the American rear. 

About ten he heard them, and began pushing Stirling 
harder. Eleven o'clock, half-past eleven, came, and 
still Stirling had no orders to retreat, although he 
judged from the firing that the enemy was rapidly gain- 
ing his rear. This was the fact. Clinton and the 
Hessians together, as we have seen, had beaten back 
Sullivan and Miles, gained the passes, and by noon had 
carried the pursuit up to the walls of Fort Putnam, 
which they could have carried by assault, no doubt, had 
they attempted it. The men were eager for it, but 
Howe would not consent. 

Meantime Cornwallis, with a heavy column, had been 
detached, and was pushing down the Port Road tow^ard 
the East River, at first on the left and then in the rear 
of Stirling's long, thin line. 

Washington remained in New York until he saw 
that the city was not to be attacked, then crossed 
to Brooklyn, and from the heights saw that Stirling 
had been surrounded and was in danger of being cut 
to pieces. He could not send relief without weak- 
ening his main line, and with anxiety that may be imag- 
ined watched that brave leader extricate himself. The 
latter saw that his only hope of escape was to drive 
Cornwallis's ad\'ance back along the Port Road toward 
Flatbush, until he could get between it and Fort Box, 
and escaoe under cover of its L'uns across Brower's mill- 

i. o 

dam. Therefore, leaving his main body, under Parsons, 



170 

fiercely engaged with Grant, he placed himself at the 
head of Sniallwood's riflemen, and moved along the 
Gowanus Road in the face of a hail of fire from can- 
non, rifies, and muskets, pushing the enemy back till 
they rallied and stood firm under cover of the old stone 
Cortelyou house, the same which had sheltered the 
Labadist travelers over a hundred years before. This 
they would have carried, no doubt, had not the British 
wheeled two guns into position before them and mowed 
the attacking column down with grape and canister. 
Three times the brave fellows charged the house, once 
driving the gunners from their pieces within its shadow. 

** Good God! " cried Washington, watching from his 
hilltop. "What brave fellows I must this day lose!" 

The odds were too great, however, and at last the 
depleted column took refuge in a cornfield, where some 
surrendered, some were bayoneted, and a few made 
their escape by swimming Gowanus Creek. Stirling 
fled over the hills and yielded up his sword to De Heis- 
ter, the Hessian commander, scorning to deliver it to the 
British. 'Meantime Parsons, on Battle Hill, had made a 
gallant stand, but his position was at last carried, and 
many of his men captured. Some of them escaped 
across the marsh. He succeeded in hiding himself in a 
swamp, and thence escaped to the American lines. This 
ended the battle of Brooklyn Heights. Of the five 
thousand Americans engaged, nearly half were killed, 
wounded, or prisoners. 

Howe did not at once attack the line of forts, though 
they were defended now by scarcely three thousand 
men. His artillery was not up, he lacked axes for cut- 



I/I 

ting palisades, scaling ladders and the like, so he sat 
down for a siege by regular approaches. 

You may be sure that it was an anxious time for 
Washington and the other patriot leaders. More troops 
were ordered over from New York. Fortunately, next 
day it rained heavily, and the British contented them- 
selves with a brisk cannonade and with sending out 
skirmishing parties. At evening they broke ground for 
intrenchments within five hundred yards of the Ameri- 
can line, and that night threw up a redoubt just east of 
Fort Putnam, from which they opened fire on that fort. 

Next day, the 29th, a dense fog hung over water and 
heights, veiling everything. News soon came that part 
of the British fleet had passed round the island and was 
now in Flushing Bay, on the north shore. This led 
Washington at five o'clock to call a council of his offi- 
cers to decide whether to retreat or to fight. They 
decided to retreat. 

The American army was in evil plight. If the 
enemy's fleet should sail up and hold the East River it 
would cut ofl" its line of retreat. (The fleet would have 
done this on the battle day, we know now, but for lack 
of a wind.) The loss in men and officers on the 2'/th 
had disorganized the army. The men were wearied 
with constant watching and alarms. Their ammunition 
had been largely spoiled by the incessant rains of the 
last two days. Lastly, Howe was raising his trenches 
against them and would soon order an assault. 

All through that eventful day Washington had been 
making secret preparations for a retreat. He had sent 
Colonel Trumbull to Assistant Quartermaster Hughes in 



172 

New York, with orders to impress at once craft of every 
description, from Spuytcn Duy vil to Hell Gate, and have 
them in the " east harbor " by dark. Orders were sent 
also to General Heath, commanding; at Kinc^sbridg-e, to 
seize all boats in his district and man them with the 
Salem and Marblehead fishermen of his command. It 
was given out that the boats would be used to ferry 
over certain New Jersey troops who were to relieve 
those on the heights. In the general orders to the 
army issued at the same time a similar fiction was em-, 
ployed, a retreat not being mentioned. The regiments 
were to be relieved by fresh New Jersey militia, and 
were commanded to be in marching order by nightfall, 
knapsack on back, and muskets and camp equipage in 
hand. 

By dark a nondescript fleet had been collected at the 
Fulton Ferry dock — sloops, sailboats, galleys, periaguas, 
scows, rowboats, whaleboats — everything afloat, and 
with the hardy fishermen of Cape Ann and Cape Cod 
in command of them. In this retreat Washiniji-ton de- 
ceived the British as completely as the latter had de- 
ceived him on the morning of the 27th. Leaving their 
camp fires brightly burning, silently as ghosts the grim 
ranks marched to the ferry through mud and darkness, 
Hitchcock's Rhode Islanders first, and then regiment 
after regiment, until by dawn all were across the river 
except General Mifl^in's six regiments, which had been 
left to hold the redoubts. 

Through all the hours of that long, dark night detec- 
tion would have meant ruin. But how were the gallant 
Mifllin and his men to be drawn off without attracting 



173 

attention? The same kind Providence which, by with- 
holding the wind, had prevented the enemy's frigates 
from ascending and holding the river, again interposed. 
Heavy masses of dense fog rolled up from the bay and 
covered the frowning heights with a gray curtain. 
Mifflin retired under its cover. As the last outpost 
stole away it heard the sound of pickax and shovel 
busily plied in the British trenches. Before 7 A. M. the 
entire force was on the New York shore. When Howe 
awoke that morning he found that an army of nine 
thousand men, with stores, baggage, and artillery, had 
been spirited away while he slept. Some one has said 
that " to conduct a skillful retreat is equal to winning 
a great victory." 



XIII. THE BATTLE OE HARLEM HEIGHTS. 

THE 30th and 31st of August, 1776, were anxious 
days in New York. Tents, arms, clothes, baggage, 
ammunition, all manner of camp equipage, soaked with 
rain, obstructed the streets and sidewalks ; squads of sol- 
diers off duty wandered wearily about or lingered on the 
corners. In the defenses — McDougall's and the Oyster 
batteries on a little hill in the rear of Trinity Church, 
Fort George and the Grand Battery in the present Bat- 
tery Park, Whitehall Redoubt at the foot of the present 
Whitehall Street, Waterbury's on the dock at the angle 
of Catherine and Cherry streets, Badlam's between 
Madison and Monroe streets, and Spencer's between 
Clinton and Montgomery — the gunners stood at atten- 
tion, for all expected an immediate attack. Why it w^as 
not made is one of several puzzling things connected 
with this whole defense of New York. 

Why, in the first place, in view of the vastly greater 
force of his enemy, boih by land and sea, did Washing- 
ton attempt to hold New York at all? The final result, 
could not have been in doubt; but if he was resolved to 
fight, why did he not seize and fortify Harlem Heights, 
including McGowans Pass, and thus keep open his line 
of retreat? And why, on the other hand, did Howe 
wait four full days after landing on the Gravesend plain 

174 



175 

before marching against the Americans, thus giving them 
time to prepare for battle? And why, after his vic- 
tory of August I'] with his superior force, did he not as- 
sault the patriots' line? And why did he not ascend 
the Hudson with his fleet and seize the undefended 
Harlem Heights, thus cutting ofT Washington's line of 
retreat and compelling him to surrender his whole 
army ? 

Washington probably decided to hold New York 
because he feared the effect on the country and on the 
world of yielding the city without a struggle. This 
was really the second battle of the war. It had been 
said that his ragged Continentals would not stand in 
open battle against the seasoned veterans of Europe, 



-1 

ii»j,AxorrinnE 
( JTV m ne\n-vork: 

S r R\-tYOR CEXI RAL 

1770. 




176 

and he wished to prove the contrary. Again, our envoys 
to France were even then at the court of the French 
king, seeking the alHance which was soon declared, and 
which the bravery of the heroes of Battle Hill and 
Mount Prospect may have hastened. As for Lord 
Howe's acts, we have no explanation for them except 
that he was in sympathy with the Americans and wished 
to aid their cause. 

New York in 1776 was a town of twenty-five thou- 




Fort at McGowans Pass, 

sand people and four thousand houses, filling the apex 
of the acute angle made by the two rivers, thus — V. 
Most of the town lay below the present Chambers 
Street, and comprised an area of less than one square 
mile. But one road led off the island, the Kingsbridge or 
" Boston Post Road," which left Broadway at the present 
post office building, followed Chatham Street to the 
present Chatham Square, thence the Bowery and Fourth 



1/7 

Avenue to Fourteenth Street, crossed Union Square 
northwest, thence followed the present line of Broadway 
to Madison Square, then turned northeast and ran on 
between Fourth and Second avenues to Fifty-third 
Street, there took a more easterly course to Ninety- 
second Street, where it turned west and entered the 
present Central Park, and continued therein until it had 
threaded a narrow defile called McGowans Pass, from 
the fact that the farmhouse of a man of that name was 
situated there. From this pass, which was about on the 
line of One Hundred and Seventh Street, the road fol- 
lowed over Harlem Lane, and crossed the Harlem 
River by a small wooden bridge called the King's bridge. 
This was the only route by which Washington's army 
could gain the high ground on the opposite shore. 

There was another road on the western side of the 
island, the '' Bloomingdale Road," which left the Post 
Road at about the present corner of Twenty-third Street 
and Fifth Avenue, and passed through the hamlet of 
Bloomingdale to the farmhouse of Adriaen Hoofland, at 
about One Hundred and Eighth Street, wliere it ended 
abruptly. Still another road ran from the upper part 
of the city to the village of Greenwich on the Hudson, 
at about the foot of the present Fourteenth Street, and 
then continued as a pretty rustic lane until it joined the 
Bloomingdale Road at Forty-third Street. The whole 
island above Fourteenth Street was a mass of crag, 
forest, swampy thicket, and natural meadow. 

With Brooklyn Heights in possession of the enemy, 
the question arose whether to defend New York or burn 
it and retreat to the Highlands of the Hudson. Wash- 

TODD, N. Y. — 12 



178 

ingtoii referred it to Congress, and that body gave him 
sole discretion in the matter. He accordingly called a 
council of his officers on September 12, at which it was 
decided tn evacuate the city ; without destroying it, how- 
ever, as it was thought that it might soon be recovered. 

It was quite time, for the l^ritish commander was 
already moving his troops wnth a view of attacking the 
city. On September 3 the frigate J^osc had sailed up 
the East River past the Battery, conveying thirty whale- 
boats to be 'used in crossing the river. On the 12th, 
thirty-six more boats passed up, and on the 14th four 
frigates and six transports joined the Rose. 

Washington now pressed all his teams and transports 
into the work of removing the sick, wounded, and stores 




Apthorpe Mansion. - 



179 

to Kingsbridge. One more day would have com- 
pleted the task; but on the morning of the 15th of 
September the British moved on the city, and that same 
afternoon captured it. Washington, the night before, 
had left New York and fixed his headquarters at the 
Apthorpe mansion, which stood on the Bloomingdale 
Road, at the corner of what is now Ninth Avenue and 
Ninety-first Street. Putnam's and Sullivan's divisions 
garrisoned the city and the forts ; Scott's New York 
brigade was stationed on the Stuy vesant estate, about on 
the line of the present East Fifteenth Street ; Wads- 
worth, with his Connecticut troops, was at Twenty-third 
Street; and Douglas, with three regiments of Connecti- 
cut militia, was at Kips Bay, at the foot of the present 
Thirty-fourth Street. 

This was the situation on Sunday morning, Septem- 
ber 15. Soon after daybreak Douglas, at Kips Bay, 
saw five frigates move up the river and come to abreast 
of his position. At the same time, from the mouth of 
Newtown Creek, on the opposite shore, issued eighty- 
four row galleys filled with grenadiers in scarlet uni- 
forms, looking, as a soldier aptly said, " like a clover 
field in full bloom." The grenadiers with their oars 
urged the boats on. As they neared the shore, all at 
once, with a burst of thunder, the seventy-five guns of 
the frigates belched a storm of grapeshot on the de- 
voted patriots. One soldier thought " his head would 
go with the sound; " "but," he added, "we kept the 
line until they were almost leveled upon us, when the 
officers, seeing we were exposed to the rake of their 
guns, gave the order to leave." 



i8o 

At the same time the galleys were beached a little to 
the left, and the grenadiers leaped ashore without oppo- 
sition. All the American brigades along the river now 
began to retreat northward toward Kingsbridge, over 
which ran, as we have said, the only road leading at 
that time from the island. But the British pursued them 
so hotly that they were soon in panic-stricken flight. 
Up the Post Road they ran, every man for himself, 
Douglas, Huntington, and Prescott in vain trying to 
check and reform them. 

Washington, at the Apthorpe house, heard the firing, 
leaped to his horse, and spurred down the Bloomingdale 
Road and across by a country lane to the Post Road, 
reaching it just as the mob of frightened fugitives came 
toiling and panting up, some taking to the fields in their 
panic, some keeping to the road. As it happened, 
Parsons's and Fellows's brigades, which had been ordered 
up to check the rout, appeared at this moment, and 
Washington shouted to them, " Take to the walls, take 
to the cornfield ! 

The men did so, but the enemy's vanguard appearing 
at this critical instant on the brow of the hill, they broke 
and fled in as much disorder as the militia. Washing- 
ton, at the sight, is said to have lost his usual self-com- 
mand, and to have dashed in among the fugitives, wav- 
ing his hat and imploring them to make a stand ; but it 
was useless, and recognizing this at last, he commanded 
the retreat to be continued, while he spurred on to Har- 
lem Heights to make preparations to receive the British 
there. 

Meantime, what of Putnam's division, which was gar- 



i8i 

risoning the forts in the lower part of the city? At the 
first sound of the guns it had been put in retreat toward 
Harlem, following the Bloomingdale Road, while Knox's 
artillery and Silliman's brigade of infantry took post at 
Bayards Hill Fort, on a bluff at about the present 
corner of Grand and Mulberry streets, to cover its re- 
treat. This was perhaps two hours before the rout at 
Murrays Hill, and the column, though moving slowly, 
was now well up the island. Putnam, finding himself 
unable to rally the fugitives on the Post Road, next 
turned his attention to his own column, first ordering 
his aid, Major Aaron Burr, with a company of dragoons, 
to bring off Knox's and Silliman's brigades at Bayards 
Hill — an order very successfully carried out by Major 
Burr, who first led the brigades to the main column, and 
then by lanes and devious ways past the British advance, 
which by this time had gained the center of the island, 
until they rejoined the main body in Harlem. 

The army was now out of the city. Harlem Heights 
had become the seat of war. 

If we visit the great brown cliff now known as Morn- 
ingside Park, and take our stand at about where One 
Hundred and Nineteenth Street crosses it, we can take 
in the battlefield at a glance. At our feet the plain of 
Harlem, now covered with brick and stone, stretches 
away to the east. North, directly across the valley, rises 
another rocky height, know^n in 1776 as Point of Rocks, 
and extending thence northwest in a series of points and 
ledges to the Hudson, the whole range being known as 
Harlem Heights. Washington massed his army on the 
Point of Rocks after the retreat, fixing his headquarters 



1 8; 



ill the Morris house (now the Jumel mansion), which 
still stands in its grounds a little southwest of High 




Jumel Mansion. 



Bridge. The British took post where we are supposed 
to stand. The plain below, then mostly covered with 
forest, was the scene of the battle of Harlem Heights. 

It was the aim of the British to drive the Americans 
from their position. The latter, however, did not stand 
on the defensive, but descended into the plain and 
brought on the battle. Washington at daylight on the 
morning of the i6th of September dispatched CohMiel 
Thomas Knowlton, with a small force, to beat up the 
forests along the bank of the Hudson, and see what the 
l^ritish were doing. Knowlton did so, found the enemy 



i83 

at the base of the cHffs, and after exchanging shots re- 
treated, drawing a force of some three hundred men in 
pursuit. On hearing the firing Washington sent his 
adjutant general, Colonel Reed, to learn the cause, and 
on the latter's reporting that Knowlton was retreating 
before a superior force, sent forward reenforcements 
which quickly put the British to flight. 

The second or main battle began at ten o'clock in the 
morning and lasted till two, ending in the defeat of the 
British. 

About ten a squadron of British cavalry appeared in 
the plain, and blew their bugles in the face of the 
Americans as at a fox hunt. Washington accepted the 
challenge and ordered Major Leitch, with his Virginian 
riflemen, and Colonel Knowlton, with his Connecticut 
rangers, to gain the rear of the British by their right 
flank, while the main body attacked them in front. At 
the sound of firing the enemy hurried up his reserves. 
Unfortunately, the riflemen and rangers, losing their 
way in the forest, struck the right flank of the British 
instead of their rear, as ordered, which alarmed the 
English commander, and he ordered up his choicest 
regiments. Washington responded by sending in 
detachments of Douglas's, Nixon's, Richardson's, and 
Griffeths's regiments, the same troops that had fled so 
ingloriously the day before, and the battle in the plain 
opened with spirit. But to-day these same troops 
fought like veterans and forced the British back upon 
their reserves on the hilltop. Knowlton and Leitch, 
on their side of the field, were equally successful, and 
rolled the British left back upon the heights. There 



1 84 

the combined forces made a stubborn stand, but at 
last were driven from the cHffs as they had been from 
the valley. About noon, meeting with reenforcements 
in their retreat, they made a fresh stand in a buck- 
wheat field, and held their ground for about two hours, 
but were finally routed again and chased for two miles, 
the Americans mocking their bugles as they pursued. 
The patriots had won a barren victory, however, except 
that it had blotted out the disgrace of the day before 
and renewed their courage and confidence in them- 
selves; for Howe remained master of New York, and 
could, by seizing Washington's line of retreat across 
the Harlem, hem him in and force him to surrender. 

The Americans continued to hold Fort Washington 
(which stood on the high point of land south of Spuy- 
ten Duyvil, at what would be the intersection of Fort 
Washington Avenue and One Hundred and Eighty- 
third Street, if cut through),^ with half a score of sup- 
porting forts and three lines of intrenchments extend- 
ing from the Hudson to the Harlem, until the morning 
of November i6, 1776, when they were attacked by a 
force of eighty-nine hundred British and Hessians under 
the immediate command of Lord Howe himself. After a 
gallant and desperate defense of two hours, the British 
threw a detachment across the Harlem below the second 
line of intrenchments and assailed the Americans in the 
rear; and a concerted attack being made in front and on 
both flanks at the same time. Colonel Robert Magaw, 
the officer in command, surrendered his entire force. 

1 James Gordon Bennett's house stands on or near the site of the north 
bastion. 



i85 

It was the most serious reverse the Americans had 
yet met. Some three thousand men, the flower of 
the American army, were captured, with forty-three 
guns and a large amount of stores. The British loss 
was seventy-eight killed and three hundred and eighty 
wounded, the American, fifty-four killed and twelve 
wounded. 



XIV. NEW YORK IN THE GRASP OF 

THE INVADER. 

WHEN Howe's army assumed control of New 
York, September i6, 1776, she bore much the 
appearance of a dismantled city. Many of the people 
had fled, takini^- with them exerything they could carry. 
Houses and stores were closed, churches and public 
buildings barred; even the bells had been removed 
from the belfries. The city remained in captivity during 
the whole period of the war. At midnight on Sep- 
tember 21, 1776, five days after Howe took possession, 
a fire broke out in a low groggery near Whitehall 
Street, and, fanned by a strong south wind, swept like a 
prairie fire through the city. Nearly every building as 
far north as King's College, including Trinity Church, 
its rectory and charity school, and the Lutheran church, 
was destroyed. Four hundred and ninety-three houses 
and several churches were burned. The British jumped 
to the conclusion that the torch had been applied by 
the Americans to prevent their using the city for winter 
quarters, and Howe so charged in his official report ; 
but this the patriot leaders indignantly denied. '* By 
what means it happened we do not know," wrote 
Washington to Governor Trumbull the day after the 

fire, and Colonel Reed wrote to his wife the same day : 

186 



1 87 



" There was a resolve in Congress against our injuring 
it, so that we neither set it on fire, nor made any prepa- 
rations for the purpose." Much suffering was experi- 
enced by the poor people thus deprived of their homes. 

Following close on the heels of the fire came one of 
the most tragical incidents of the Revolution — the exe- 
cution of Captain Nathan Hale of Connecticut as a 
spy. This gallant young officer, barely 
twenty-one, a graduate of Yale College, 
and about to be married to a beautiful 
girl, at Washington's request had volun- 
teered to enter the British lines and gain 
intelligence of Howe's numbers, position, 
and plans. Disguised as a wandering 
schoolmaster, he succeeded, and had on 
his return nearly regained his whale- 
boat at Huntington, when he was 
captured by a yawl from a British 
frigate lying near by, and sent to New 
York as " a prisoner taken within 
the lines," that is, as a spy. 

He had known before venturing 
what his fate would be if taken — 
death by hanging. Howe called a 

court martial for the next day to try him, but Hale told 
them he would save them the trouble, and boldly avowed 
himself a spy in the service of General Washington. 
The board thereupon condemned liim to be hanged the 
next day, which was Sunday. Hale met his fate with 
a lofty patriotism which has rendered him immortal. 
As he stood upon a cart under an apple tree in the 




Nathan Hale. 



i88 

Rutgers orchard, with the noose about his neck, one of 
his enemies said tauntingly, " This is a fine death for 
a soldier." "Sir," replied Hale, "there is no death 
which would not be rendered noble in such a glorious 
cause." His last words have become a heritage of the 
race. " I only regret," said he, " that I have but one 
life to lose for my country." 

For seven years martial law governed the city. New 
York became the headquarters of the British army, 
its storehouse and hospital, and the prison of those 
Americans unfortunate enough to be taken in arms. 
In the battles at the time of its capture it is estimated 
that five thousand prisoners were taken. The usual 
prisons could not accommodate them, and so the 
French church, the Brick, Middle Dutch, and North 
Dutch churches were seized and turned into prisons. 
Besides these King's College, the sugarhouse on Liberty 
Street, the new jail, the Bridewell, and the old City 
Hall were also used. As the war progressed and more 
captives were taken, old ships condemned for unsea- 
worthiness were moored in the East River and used for 
prisons. The sufTerings of the poor prisoners confined 
in them were terrible, and thousands died. 

In Liberty Street, just south of the Middle Dutch 
Church, stood within the memory of men now living a 
heavy, gloomy stone building, five stories high, with 
small, deep windows rising tier above tier like portholes 
in a ship of the line. Each of its five floors was divided 
into two bare, dungeonlike apartments, on the walls of 
which might be traced the names of prisoners carved 
there nearly a century before. 



1 89 




fe-^. 









^[ -^S^^^MM^^M 



This was the old sugarhouse of the Livingstons, 
the prison of most ominous fame of any of the Revolu- 
tion, A strong oaken door opened on Liberty Street, 
and another on the southeast gave access to a damp, 
vermin-infested cellar. While held as a prison two 
sentinels were con- 
stantly on guard to 
prevent the escape 
of the desperate cap- 
tives. Truly they 
w^ho entered here 
left hope behind, like 
the wretches whom 
Dante saw crossing 
the portals of the 
inferno. 

" In the suffocat- 
ing heat of summer," 
wrote William Dunlap, " I saw every narrow aperture of 
those stonewalls filled with human heads, face above face, 
seeking a portion of the external air." ** Seats there 
were none," testified another eyewitness, **and their beds 
were but straw intermixed with vermin. For many 
weeks the dead cart visited the prison every morning, 
into which eight and ten corpses were flung, piled up 
like sticks of wood, and then dumped into ditches in 
the outskirts of the city." 

The prison ships were even worse, if we may believe 
the tales told of them. They were at first assigned to 
prisoners taken on the high seas, but later confined 
landsmen as well. The principal ships were the Jersey, 



The Livingston Sugarhouse. 



190 

Whitby, Good Hope, Scorpion, FalnioutJi, Prince of 
Wales, Hunter, and Strojnbo/o. Of the Jersey the more 
fearful tales were told, perhaps because in her more 
were confined and more died in their bonds. It has been 
asserted that 10,644 prisoners, the flower of American 
manhood, died in her during the war, and were buried 
on the adjoining" Brooklyn shore. Her position was in the 
little bay known as the Wallabout, now the Navy Yard. 

The prisoner newly committed to her fever-infected 
hold was brought on board, his name and rank taken, 
his- weapons and money, if he had any, removed, and 
he was then ordered below, where he found a thousand 
wretched beings racked with disease and emaciated 
with hunger. He was at once assigned to a "mess" 
of six men, and every morning, as the steward's bell 
sounded, formed in line, and received his daily ration of 
biscuit, peas, beef or pork. On some days flour, suet, 
oatmeal, and butter were added to this bill of fare, but 
never fresh vegetables. "The peas," said a survivor, 
" were damaged, the butter rancid, the biscuit moldy 
and often full of worms, the flour sour, the beef and 
pork unsavory. Not so much the fault of the king as 
of his rapacious commissioners, who exchanged good 
provisions for bad, and by curtailing rations and by 
other expedients heaped up large fortunes at the ex- 
pense of the prisoners." 

The suff"ering and mortality here are not to be ascribed 
so much to the British government as to the petty ofii- 
cers placed over the prisoners, who not only robbed 
them, but took a brutal delight in torturing them and 
adding to their discomforts in every way possible. 



191 

When morning came, the hatches were removed, the 
poor prisoners brought up their beds and spread them 
on the deck to air, washed down the floors, and spent 
the day on deck. At sunset the guards would cry, 
"Down, rebels, down!" The hatches were then put 
in place and fastened, and the captives stretched them- 
selves in rows to sleep in the stifling, feverish air. If 
one died, his fellows sewed the body in his blanket; 
it was lowered into a boat, which was rowed ashore 
by the guard, and the body buried in a shallow 
trench. 

There were many escapes. For instance, on a stormy 
night in 1779, nine sea captains and two pirates over- 
powdered the guard and escaped in the ship's boat. 
The following winter fifteen prisoners gained their 
freedom by walking on the ice, that formed sufficiently 
hard to bear them. 

New York was not a very pleasant place to live in 
during these seven years of war. Martial law prevailed ; 
that is, there was no law but the will of the commander 
in chief. Any citizen might on suspicion be seized by 
the brutal provost guard and sent to prison, to be tried 
by a military court. 

The burnt district (added to by another great fire 
in August, 1778) was soon covered by a nondescript 
array of tents and shanties that housed the scum and 
refuse of the British army — desperate villains, insomuch 
that respectable citizens were afraid to venture into the 
streets after dark. The people, too, were in constant fear 
of an attack by the Americans. All the adherents of 
the patriot cause who could left tlie city. On the other 



192 

hand, many Tories whom the Americans had driven from 
the country fled hither for protection. Business was 
largely suspended. 

It is doubtful if any but the Tories were sad when the 
news of peace came and the British prepared to leave 
the city. The 25th of November, 1783, was appointed 
for this happy event. At an early hour the rear guard 
of the British army embarked at the Battery and pulled 
away to their ships. At the same time the Continen- 
tals marched down from the Bowery with drums beat- 
ing and standards waving in the breeze. 

When the head of the column reached Cope's Tavern, 
at the corner of Broadway and Rector Street, it halted 
to receive a civic procession that had started from the 
Bull's Head Tavern, in the Bowery, about the same time. 
In this procession marched most of the notables, civil 
and military, of the day. 

Captain Delevan's Westchester Light Horse led the 
advance. Next came General Washington, and George 
Clinton, governor of New York, with their suites, on 
horseback; next the lieutenant governor and members 
of the city council for the time being, four abreast ; then 
the generals of the army, — Knox, Steuben, McDougall, 
James Clinton, and others, — eight abreast; then citizens 
on horseback; next the Speaker of the Assembly, and 
after liim a great body of citizens on foot. When the 
head of this procession halted before Cope's Tavern, the 
soldiers presented arms, the drums beat, the people 
cheered, and the guns of Fort George thundered a 
salute. Addresses were then made to tlie general and 
the governor by prominent citizens, and in the evening 



193 

there was a grand banquet at Fraunces's Tavern. Thus 
New York welcomed her own again. 

Governor CHnton took up his residence in the De 
Peyster mansion, on Queen Street (now Pearl), near 
Cedar, and at once set in motion the government of the 
new State of New York. In December, aldermen were 
elected : two months later the governor's council ap- 
pointed James Duane the first mayor of republican New 
York, and the city government was complete. 

Another and still more dramatic scene occurred in 
New York during this period, and fitly closes this 
chapter — the leave-taking of his officers by Washington, 
the beloved commander in chief. This took place in 
the ** great room " of Fraunces's Tavern, the fashion- 
able hotel of the day, where Washington had fixed his 
headquarters. Here, on Thursda}^ December 4, 1783, 
the general officers assembled for the last farewell. 
They would never meet again as soldiers of the Con- 
tinental army. 

Washington and many of the bearded warriors are 
said to have been affected to tears. The former entered 
the room, and taking a glass of wine in his hand, said : 
" With a heart filled with love and gratitude, I now 
take leave of you. I most devoutly wish that your 
latter days may be as prosperous and happy as your 
former ones have been glorious and honorable." 

Having drained the glass, he continued: "I cannot 
come to each of you to take my leave, but shall be 
obliged to you if each will come and take me by the 
hand." 

General Knox, Washington's favorite officer, stood 

TODD, N. Y. — 13 



194 

nearest him, and at these words turned and grasped his 
hand, and while tears rolled down the cheeks of both 
the commander in chief kissed him. This he did to 
all in turn, while sounds of grief filled the room. Soon, 
however, Washington regained his usual composure, and 
walked to the Whitehall, followed by a great multitude, 
who cheered again and again for the savior of his coun- 
try ; but escaping from them, he entered a barge and 
was rowed to Paulus Hook, where he took stage for 
Philadelphia and the retirement of Mount Vernon. 



XV. NEW YORK THE CAPITAL CITY. 

NEW YORK is the metropolis of America, the 
second city of the world, yet she may well pride 
herself on the fact that she was the first capital of the 
infant republic, that in her borders the Constitution was 
first tried, the first President inaugurated, and the wheels 
of national government first set in motion. Washington 
was elected the first President, as you know. The first 
Congress under the Constitution was to have met in New 
York on the 4th of March, i 789, to count the votes for 
President; but neither the Senate nor the House had a 
quorum on that day, the members having been delayed 
by bad roads, swollen rivers, and March mud, so that it 
was not until the 6th of April that both houses organized 
and declared George Washington the unanimous choice 
of the American people for President. 

The President elect, apprised at Mount Vernon by 
official messenger, left his home on the i6th of April, 
and after a triumphal progress reached New York on 
the 23d of April. John Adams of Massachusetts, the 
newly elected Vice President, had preceded him, arriving 
on the 20th. It took a week to complete the prepara- 
tions for the inaugural ceremonies, which, as completing 
the fabric of a national government, it had been decided 
should be of the most imposing character. On the day 

195 



196 

appointed, Thursday, April 30, 1789, the thunder of 
guns aroused the people. At nine o'clock every bell in 
the city rang a merry peal for a few moments and then 
suddenly ceased. 

The din of traffic was hushed, but the Sabbath 
silence of the streets was soon broken by the tread of 




Washington's Reception at New York. 

multitudes in gala attire, citizens and visitors. New 
York had never before welcomed so many strangers. 
They came from town and country for a hundred miles 
around, by packet, stagecoach, and private conveyance, 
to hail the nativity of a new nation. Each awaited with 
solemn gladness the commencement of the ceremonies. 
After a measured interval the bells began again in 



197 

slow, solemn tones, calling the people to the churches to 
invoke God's blessing on the young nation and its un- 
tried President. 

After the religious exercises the military escort 
formed in Cherry Street, opposite the President's home, 
and as he appeared, attended by a joint committee of the 
Senate and House of Representatives appointed to escort 
him to the capitol, formed in columns and took position 
at the head of the procession. The august body then 
moved to the capitol in the following order : the sheriff 
of the city and county of New York, the commiittee of 
the Senate, the President elect, the committee of the 
House, Chancellor Robert R. Livingston, John Jay, 
Henry Knox, the commissioners of the Treasury, and 
distinguished citizens in carriages. The capitol was the 
former City Hall of New York, that stood on the corner 
of Nassau and Wall streets, where now you see the 
subtreasury of the United States, with the statue of 
Washington before it. The building had been re- 
modeled and renovated by Major Pierre L'Enfant, the 
great French engineer who later laid out the federal city 
of Washington. The procession marched up Broad 
Street to Wall, and then halted in front of the capitol ; 
the regiments opened ranks, and Washington and the 
distinguished company passed through into the capitol, 
and up the broad stairway to the senate chamber, where 
both houses of Congress were assembled. As Washing- 
ton entered, John Adams, the Vice President, and there- 
fore presiding officer of the Senate, arose, advanced, 
received him with the stately courtesy of the day, and 
conducted him to the Vice President's chair, which he 



198 

had just left. Then, after presenting him to the august 
body, he thus addressed him : 

"Sir: The Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States are ready to attend you to take the oath 
required by the Constitution, which will be administered 
by the chancellor of the State of New York." 

" I am ready to proceed," was the President's reply. 

Washington and Adams, arm in arm, then walked to a 
balcony overlooking Wall Street, followed by Chancellor 
Livingston in his judicial robes, by the senators and 
representatives. An inspiring sight met their eyes 
as they emerged upon the gallery. Wall and Broad 
streets were a sea of upturned faces. All the windows, 
balconies, and housetops in the vicinity were laden with 
ladies in gala attire. Flags and banners, caressed by 




Inauguration of Washington. 



199 



the mild spring zephyrs and bearing the magic name 
" Washington," waved everywhere. From the whole 
vast throng not a whisper arose. Soon the confused 
mass in the balcony resolved itself into three central 
figures — the noble form of the President on the right, 
opposite him Chancellor Livingston, and between them 
the secretary of the Senate, 
James Otis, holding upon a 
crimson cushion an open Bible. 
Then the chancellor, in a voice 
that reached every ear, re- 
peated the solemn oath : 

'' You do solemnly swear 
that you will faithfully exe- 
cute the office of President 
of the United States, and 
will to the best of your ability 
preserve, protect, and defend 
the Constitution of the United 
States." 

"I swear," said Washington, as he bent to kiss the 
Bible, adding with fervor, "so help me God." 

Chancellor Livingston turned to the people, and wav- 
ing his hand, cried with strong, triumphant voice, " Long 
live George Washington, President of the United 
States," and the people answered with resounding 
cheers, while the spires shook with the pealing of bells, 
and the air trembled with the thunder of cannon from 
ship and fort. 

For a year New York continued to be the court town. 
Washington and his cabinet, — Jefferson^ Secretary of 




Washington's Chair at the 
Inauguration. 



200 

State, Hamilton, Secretary of the Treasury, Knox, 
Secretary of War, — Adams, the Vice President, John 
Jay, the first chief justice of the United States Supreme 
Court, Governor Geor^^^e Chnton, and other high officers 
of government removed their famihes to the city, and 
formed a court circle modeled somewhat after that of 
European capitals. 

There was far more of stately ceremonial and eti- 
quette about official life in those days than now. For 
instance, the President delivered his messages to Con- 
gress in person, after the fashion of the English kings, 
instead of sending them by his secretary as now. In 
his diary for January 8, 1790, Washington gives an 
interesting account of this ceremony. He set out at 
eleven o'clock for Federal Hall, he tells us, in a coach 
drawn by six horses, preceded by his secretary, Colonel 
Humphreys, and Major Johnson on horseback, followed 
by Messrs. Lear and Nelson in his chariot, and by Mr. 
Lewis on horseback. In their rear came the chief justice 
of the United States and the secretaries of the Treasury 
and War departments in their carriages. As he entered 
all rose, and remained standing until he sat. After all 
were seated he rose and delivered his speech, and then 
gave one copy to the president of the Senate and an- 
other to the Speaker of the House, after which he bowed 
and retired with his party. 

In a few days Congress returned an answer to the 
speech, " the members of both [houses] coming in car- 
riages " for the purpose, and " the answer of the Senate 
being presented by the Vice President, and that of the 
House by the Speaker," 



DO 
1" 



9>^ 
M 

5' 

CTQ 
O 

H 



CD 




(20I) 



202 

In the social amenities of the day Washington figured 
prominently. He leased a house, at first Mr. Osgood's, 
and later the McComb mansion on Broadway, a little 
south of Trinity Church, and removed thither with his 
wife, his horses, carriages, and retinue of servants, from 
Mount Vernon. He entertained generously, and was 
entertained with equal hospitality. At one time, we 
read, he honored Secretary and Mrs. Hamilton and 
several others with tickets to his private box in the 
John Street theater. At another, after a dinner party 
he went with Mrs. Washington to the dancing assembly 
and remained there until ten o'clock. On Christmas 
day he "went to St. Paul's Chapel in the forenoon." 
The houses of Jay, Hamilton, Vice President Adams, 
and Governor Clinton were also centers of social cour- 
tesies during this period. 

Meantime the question of a permanent site for a 
capital was agitating the nation. New York would 
doubtless have been chosen, but the State was not will- 
ing to cede the ten miles square of territory demanded. 
Philadelphia's claims were warmly advocated, but 
Southern congressmen objected, because her Quakers 
were ** eternally dogging Southern members with their 
schemes of emancipation." Virginia, Maryland, and 
other Southern States advocated a site on the Potomac, 
which after much discussion was adopted ; but while our 
present capital city of Washington was being built Con- 
gress decided to hold its sessions in Philadelphia, and 
when it rose on the I2th of August, 1790, it adjourned 
to meet in that city the next December. 



XVI. THE GROWTH OF PARTIES. 

FOR the first few years after the war the law ofTered 
the best field to the strong and ardent spirits of 
the day. Litigation was rife, — confiscated estates, civil 
boundaries, debts of individuals and States, gave large 
employment to the courts, — while the law then, as now, 
was the door to political preferment. There were two 
parties from the beginning. Federalist and Republican, 
first defined by the struggle over the Constitution, but 
still very loosely organized. The Federalist was styled 
by its opponents the "English party." Its leaders 
regarded the British Constitution as the most perfect 
that could be devised, and wished to pattern the Ameri- 
can Constitution after it. They disliked and distrusted 
France, and advocated a strong central government, a 
standing army, a diplomatic service like that of Euro- 
pean nations, a restriction of the suffrage, and encour- 
agement of domestic industries by a protective tariff. 

The Republicans, on the other hand, stood for State 
rights and powers ; they advocated the utmost simplicity 
and economy in government, the doing away with the 
state and etiquette of courts, a well-drilled militia in- 
stead of a standing army, open sessions of Congress, an 
extension of the franchise, free trade, and the encour- 
agement of agriculture and internal trade rather than of 

203 



204 

foreign commerce. Washington, Adams, and Hamilton 
were the recognized leaders of the Federalists; Jeffer- 
son, Madison, and, later, Aaron Burr, of the Republicans. 

The successful working of the new Constitution, which 
was based largely on Federal principles, placed the 
Federalists in power, and this advantage they main- 
tained for the first eleven years of our national life. 
But in the presidential election of 1800 a condition arose 
in our city of New York which defeated them. 

There were two able men then living in New York, 
rivals in law, politics, and other things, Alexander Hamil- 
ton and Aaron Burr. Hamilton was the superior of 
Burr in statesmanship and depth of intellect, but was 
far excelled by the latter in tact, executive force, and 
mastery over men. ]^urr liad been senator from New 
York I 791- r 796, and in the presidential election of 1796 
had received thirty electoral votes for President. In 
1796 he had been defeated for reelection to the Senate 
by the Federalists under Hamilton's leadership, and in 
revenfre set to work to wrest New York from them 
in the approaching presidential contest of 1800, seeing 
clearly that with the vote of New York the Republicans 
could elect their candidate for President. Presidential 
electors at tliat time were chosen by the State legisla- 
tures; Burr therefore caused himself to be elected to 
the legislature of New York, and, while there, with favors 
and compliments made himself popular with rural mem- 
bers, whom he knew to possess great influence over their 
constituents at home. He was also in constant com- 
munication with his party leaders in other States, and 
arranged with them a plan of campaign. 



205 



As the year 1800 approached, he bent all his mar- 
velous powers so to organize and discipline the Repub- 
lican party in New York as to win victory at the polls. 
He began by gathering about him a body of able, ardent, 
resolute spirits, young lawyers mostly, ambitious to rise, 
and imparted to them his courage and energy. They 
were the " ward workers," — a term now for the first 
time known in American politics, — who attended prima- 
ries and caucuses, and got out the full vote, nay, more, 
made lists of the whole body of freemen, noting the 
name, age, habits, residence, health, and religion of each, 
for the use of their principal. 

You must remember that at this time New York was 
Federal in politics. John Jay was governor. In the 
State election of 1799 the Republicans had been beaten 
by a majority of nine hundred votes. In April, 1800, 
the legislature which would elect presidential electors 
was to be chosen. Burr bent every 
effort to make it Republican: he 
nominated only the strongest men — 
George Clinton, so long governor of 
New York, General Horatio Gates, 
the conqueror of Burgoyne, Samuel 
Osgood, Washington's Postmaster 
General, and others of equal stand- 
ing; he held ward and general 
meetinors and addressed them in 
his nervous, vigorous, fiery way, 

supervised his ward workers, and noted every move of 
his adversary with the eye of a lynx. 

Hamilton, w^ho again led the Federalists, also threw 




Alexander Hamilton. 



2o6 

all his heart and soul into this contest. It was the bit- 
terest political conflict the young nation had yet seen. 
As election day approached the result was felt to be 
doubtful. The polls opened on the 29th of April, and 
continued open for three days. It was a time of great 
excitement in the city. Newspapers, broadsides, 
pamphlets, flew about like leaves in autumn. From 
large platforms the rival leaders addressed the people, 
often by turns, one listening while the other spoke, and 
then rising and replying. 

At sunset on May 2 the polls closed, and before the 
electors slept they knew that the Republicans had car- 
ried the city by four hundred and ninety votes, which 
made the State Republican, and insured the success of 
the Republican candidates for President and Vice Presi- 
dent, Thomas Jeff"erson and Aaron Burr. 

Out of the strife and bitterness engendered in this 
conflict grew the duel between General Hamilton and 
Colonel Burr on July 1 1, 1804, which consigned Hamil- 
ton to the grave, and made Burr an outcast and wan- 
derer on the earth. 

After the presidential contest of 1804 officious friends 
bore to Colonel Burr certain remarks reflecting on his 
character said to have been uttered by General Hamil- 
ton. By and by these remarks were printed in one of 
the party organs in the city. Colonel Burr at once sent 
the newspaper by a friend to General Hamilton, and 
demanded an acknowledgment or denial of the use of 
such expressions. General Hamilton replied that if 
Colonel Burr would single out any one expression or 
statement he would deny or acknowledge it, but he 



207 

could not undertake to give a general denial or ac- 
knowledgment as to what he had or had not said in 
the heat of political debate for a period of several years. 

Colonel Burr replied that the remarks said to have 
been made by General Hamilton cast dishonor upon him, 
and again demanded that General Hamilton should deny 
them or take the consequences. General Hamilton re- 
fusing to deny, a challenge was given and accepted. 

The duel, savage and murderous as we now justly 
regard it, was then the recognized mode among gentle- 
men of settling affairs of this sort. Both Burr and 
Hamilton had recognized it. A few years before, 
Hamilton's eldest son, a youth of great promise, had 
fallen in a duel. Burr had been a principal in one of 
the savage affairs. The partisans of both had fought 
for the honor of their chiefs and with their approval. 
For either of the latter to have refused to fight at 
this juncture would have been to sacrifice his posi- 




The Duel between Burr and Hamilton. 



208 

tion in society and fall in pnblic esteem. And so, 
although Hamilton at heart detested the code, they met 
on the " dark and bloody ground " of Weehavvken, sacred 
to these encounters. 

The station of the West Shore Railroad is a little 
north of the bench in the cliff \\here the duel took 
place, but on the verge of the crag above you will find 



^a^i^^jf^ 










Hamilton's Residence. 



a small stone pillar with an inscription which nearly 
mirks its location. 

Hamilton fell at the first fire, mortally wounded. 
Burr escaped unharmed. The fainting statesman was 
rowed across the rix-er and tendcrh' carried to the resi- 
dence nearest at hand, that of Mr. Bayard of Greenwich, 
his own beautiful country seat, '* the Grange," in the 
northern part of the island, being too far away to be 
reached by one in his condition. Servants were hastily 



209 

sent for surgeons and nurses, and Mrs. Hamilton and the 
children summoned. 

The fatal meeting occurred at sunrise. The victim 
died at two o'clock next day. The news rapidly spread 
through the city, and called from all classes expressions 
of grief, pity, and sympathy, mingled with execrations 
on the slayer. 

At a meeting of the merchants held the same evening 
it was resolved to close the stores on the day of the 
funeral, to wear crape for thirty days, and to order the 
flags on the shipping at half-mast. 

The lawyers met next morning and agreed to wear 
mourning for six weeks. The Society of the Cincinnati, 
the Tammany Society, the students of Columbia Col- 
lege, the St. Andrew's Society, the General Society of 
Mechanics, the various military companies, the cor- 
poration of the city, all passed resolutions of sym- 
pathy, and pledged themselves to attend the funeral in 
a body. 

The statesman's death occurred on Thursday after- 
noon. His funeral was held in Trinity Church the 
succeeding Saturday. A more imposing pageant than 
the funeral cortege as it moved slowly down Broadway, 
amid the booming of minute guns from the Battery and 
war ships in the bay, the city had never seen. When 
all were assembled in the church, with the four sons of 
the dead statesman beside him, the eldest sixteen, the 
youngest four, Gouverneur Morris, the lifelong friend 
of Hamilton, delivered an eloquent and pathetic funeral 
oration. 

Thus tragically passed from the scene one of the 

TODD, N. Y. — 14 



2IO 

greatest spirits New York has ever numbered among 
her citizens — 

THE PATRIOT OF INCORRUPTIBLE INTEGRITY, 

THE SOLDIER OF APPROVED VALOR, 

THE STATESMAN OF CONSUMMATE WISDOM, 

as one may read on his modest tombstone in Trinity 
churchyard. 

His honest fame is the city's heritage. For our in- 
struction let us glance at the salient points of his career. 
Born in the West Indian island of St. Nevis in 1757, his 
father a Scotch merchant, his mother a French lady of 
good family, he was sent in boyhood to a grammar 
school at Elizabethtown, New Jersey, and as soon as 
he was fitted entered King's College in New York. 
His first public appearance was when the disagreement 
between Great Britain and her colonies began. Al- 
though but eighteen, he wrote a series of papers in 
defense of the rights of the colonists, which were so 
able that they were at first thought to have been 
written by the eminent statesman John Jay, and they 
gained him the notice and respect of the patriot leaders. 
During the Revolution he was at first in command 
of a company of artillery, and later the aid-de-camp 
and trusted friend and admirer of Washington. In 
1782 he was admitted to the bar, and the same year 
was elected a representative from New York to the 
Continental Congress, in 1786 a member of the New 
York legislature, and in 1787 a delegate to the con- 
vention which met at Philadelphia, as it was said, to 
revise the old Articles of Confederation, but which 



211 

really produced the Constitution under which we have 
since lived. 

Hamilton and Madison were the chief authors of that 
instrument. After being adopted by the convention it 
had to be ratified by the States before it could become 
the law of the land. Several States were opposed to 
it, New York among them, and to overcome their ob- 
jections and silence cavilers, Hamilton, Jay, and Madi- 
son wrote a series of masterly state papers, which 
first appeared in the New York " Daily Advertiser," 
and were later collected and published as " The Feder- 
alist." Of the eighty-five papers in that work fifty-one 
were written by Hamilton. 

When the new government went into effect in 1789, 
Washington appointed Hamilton Secretary of the Trea- 
sury, and in this capacity he originated the fiscal policy 
of the young nation, and rescued it from the condition of 
bankruptcy and ruined credit in which the war had left 
it. In 1795 he resigned this office to resume the practice 
of the law in New York, and so continued until his death. 

In New York the popular feeling against his slayer 
was for a time intense. Although holding the exalted 
office of Vice President of the United States, Burr 
was indicted for murder, and would probably have 
been arrested had he remained in the city. Later, as 
you know, he was arrested on a charge of treason, tried 
at Richmond in Virginia, and acquitted, but fearing a 
second arrest, fled to Europe. Good came of his act, 
however, for it brought dueling into disrepute, and 
abolished from polite society that savage and barbarous 
outgrowth of feudalism. 



212 

The heated contest of 1800 taught poHticians the 
power of party (Hsciphne, and led to the birth of the 
present Tammany Society as a pohtical organization. 
This now powerful society had been founded in 1789 by 
moderate men of both parties as a patriotic and benevo- 
lent order, with a view^ also of counteracting the influ- 
ence of the Society of the Cincinnati, w^hich had been 
founded by the surviving officers of the Revolution soon 
after the war, and w^iich many thought aristocratic and 
unrepublican. The Tammany Society was intended 
also to placate the Indians and protect them in their 
rights. To this end it was named after a famous Indian 
chief, Tammany, and adopted Indian names, forms, and 
ceremonies, the year being divided into seasons, — blos- 
soms, fruits, and snows, — and the seasons into moons. 
The members were called "braves; " the officers com- 
prised thirteen *' sachems " (who elected a " grand 
sachem "), a sagamore, and a winkinskie. John Pin- 
tard was the first sagamore; the grand sachem in 1 791 
was Josiah Ogden HofTman, and the scribe of the coun- 
cil De Witt Clinton. In the spring of i 791 John Pintard, 
the real founder of the society, wrote to a friend in Bos- 
ton : " This being a strong national society, I ingrafted 
an antiquarian scheme of a museum upon it. It makes 
small progress with a small fund and may succeed. We 
have a tolerable collection of pamphlets,, mostly modern, 
with some history, of which I will send you an ab- 
stract." 

This "museum" became in 1804 the present New 
York Historical Societv, and its collection was the 
nucleus of the priceless treasures of books, pamphlets, 



213 

newspapers, paintings, relics, and curios now owned 
by that society, but hidden and of httle avail because 
of the want of a suitable building in which to dis- 
play them. 

After the contests of 1800 and 1804, as before re- 
marked, Tammany became more and more a political 
organization, and has since almost continuously held 
political control of the city of New York, chiefly because 
of the stern discipline and admirable political machinery 
first set in motion by Aaron I^urr in 1800. 



XVII. HER RISE TO COMMERCIAL POWER. 

THE genius of New York is commercial and 
financial ; her proud position as metropolis of the 
western continent is due alike to her merchants, manu- 
facturers, and financiers, and to her situation on an is- 
land, with a great navigable river on one side, an arm of 
the sea on the other, and an unrivaled harbor before. 
These alone would have made her a queen of traffic 
even if the genius of man had not created the canal 
and railroad to bring to her warehouses the products 
of the mines, fields, and forests of nearly four million 
square miles of territory. 

Almost immediately on gaining her freedom the 
young city began extending her commerce. Trade 
with England and her colonies revived. The starry flag 
became a familiar object in French, German, and Russian 
ports. In a few years New York had won her share 
of the rich trade of the Mediterranean, and a little later 
competed with the merchants of Salem and Boston for 
the priceless fabrics, the gems, teas, and spices of China 
and India. It was not until after the War of 1812-1815, 
however, that she began that marvelous growth and 
development which in less than a century has made her 
the second city of the world. In 1783 she had 23,000 

inhabitants; in 1810, 95,000; in 1898, 3,389,753. This 

214 



215 




Clermont. 



growth, in addition to the natural causes before cited, 
has been brought about by three beneficent genii that 
about 1 815 came to her aid — the steamboat, the canal, 
and the railroad. 

The steamboat came first, Fulton's historic Clermont 
having been the first to make a successful voyage. She 
steamed up the 
Hudson to Albany 
in 1807, frighten- 
ing half out of their 
wits the simple 
countrymen and 
river men, who || 
thought her some 
grisly visitor from 
the nether world. 
Her inventor, Robert Fulton, was one of the greatest 
men of his age. Like many other great men, he was 
of humble lineage, having been born on a farm in 
Little Britain (now Fulton), near Lancaster, Penn- 
sylvania, in the year 1765. He was a talented 
painter, but is chiefly remembered for his inventions 
and discoveries in mechanical science — steamboats, 
torpedo boats, and improvements in canals and canal 
boats. Ferryboats, and the movable slips into which 
they run, were among his most notable inventions. 

After many experiments, trials, and failures the Cler- 
mont was at length finished. Then it was advertised 
that she would sail for Albany on her trial trip on the 
morning of August 1 1, 1807. A great crowd gathered 
at the dock to see her depart, for many witticisms had 



2l6 



been launched at her and her projector while she was 
building-, and few believed that she could be forced 
against wind and tide by the power of vapor " confined 
in a kettle." But the C/er;jio// 1 steamtd steadily north- 
ward on her way to Albany, and those who had come 

to laugh went away 
to wonder, gossip, 
and admire. 

Her maiden vov- 
age proved a com- 
plete success. She 
arrived at " Cler- 
mont," Mr. Living- 
ston's countrv seat, a 
distance of on^ hun- 
dred and ten miles, 
in twenty-four hours, 
and at Albany in 
eight hours more, 
making the entire 
distance of one hun- 
dred and fifty miles 
in thirty-two hours, 
against both wind and tide. Of course this was a very 
slow passage compared with that of our modern palatial 
steamers which make the distance in a night, but when 
set over against the time of the packet sloops — from 
four to seven days — it was deemed a marvelous achieve- 
ment. 

Fulton had two powerful friends in Joel Barlow, the 
poet and statesman, and Robert R. Livingston, the 




Robert Fulton. 



21/ 

former of whom advanced him money to begin his ex- 
periments in Paris, while the latter became his partner 
in building the Clermont, and secured for her owners 
the exclusive privilege of navigating the waters of New 
York for a term of years. 

The Clennoiit at once began making regular trips to 
Albany as a passenger boat, never lacking for patron- 
age. Soon rival boats were built and placed on the 
river in defiance of the exclusive privilege given to 
Fulton and Livingston, who had recourse to the courts 
to protect their rights. By 1809 there was a regular 
weekly line of steam packets to Albany. By 181 3 
this had grown to a triweekly line, the boats leaving 
New York every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday 
afternoon. 

Meanwhile inventors were busily engaged improving 
on the original boat, and by 181 7 the time of passage 
had been reduced to eighteen hours. In 18 18 the 
present steamboat service on Long Island Sound was be- 
gun, the Fulton, under Fulton and Livingston's patent, 
plying between New York and New Haven, and the 
Connecticut, an independent boat, making regular trips 
to New London. In 1822 the New York and Provi- 
dence line, the nucleus of the present Sound lines to 
Boston, was formed. By 1830 there were eighty-six 
steamboats running on New York waters. 

A year before this, a man had settled in New^ York 
who was destined to become a great factor in the com- 
mercial development of the city — Cornelius Vanderbilt. 
He had been born at Port Richmond on Staten Island 
thirty-five years before, a poor boy, but strong in body 



2l8 




Cornelius Vanderbilt. 



and mind, and intent on rising in the world. At six- 
teen he liad .sa\ed money enough to buy a sailboat, 
and with it oj^ened a ferry between Staten Island and 

. New York. The venture proved 
profitable, and at eighteen he 
owned two boats and had saved 
one thousand dollars in money. 
The steamboat early attracted 
his attention. The traffic would 
not warrant placing one on his 
Staten Island route, and Fulton 
and Livingston had a monopoly 
of the Hudson and the Sound; 
but he saw that a line might be 
operated to New Brunswick, New 
Jersey, there connecting w^ith stages to Philadelphia, and 
in 1817, at the age of twenty-three, with nine thousand 
dollars in the bank, he joined another steamboat finan- 
cier, Thomas Gibbons, in building a small steamer to 
run to New Brunswick. When he left this line in 1829 
it was paying forty thousand dollars a year. But in 
1829 Fulton and Livingston's monopoly of the Hudson 
and Sound ceased, and Vanderbilt saw opening before 
him a wider field. 

He removed to New York, and entered with ardor 
on the business of transportation in New^ York waters, 
soon making his presence felt. He found the steamboat 
service of the day wretched, the boats small and slow, 
the cabins filthy and ill ventilated, the rates of fare high. 
At once he set about building large, new, full-powered 
boats, and at the same time reduced fares, the result 



19 




Daniel Drew. 



being that in a short time he was practically in control 

of the Sound and river traffic. 

His success naturally raised up competitors, — Colonel 

John Stevens, Dean Richmond, Daniel Drew, kings of 

finance and transportation, — but 

Commiodore Vanderbilt distanced 

them all. Between 1829 and 1848 

he owned and operated nearly fifty 

steamboats, most of which were built 

for him. The California gold ex- 
citement of 1849 led him into ocean 

steamship ventures, and he founded 

an opposition line to that of the 

Pacific Mail Steamship Company, 

the prize being the passenger traffic to California across 

the Isthmus of Darien. This resulted in his opponents 

buying him off, as there was 
not trade enough for both. 

A little later, in 1855, he 
established a line of steamers 
from New York to Havre, 
France, which, being larger, 
swifter, and better appointed 
than the Collins line, then 
running to England, soon 
gained large patronage. This 

line he continued until the breakinsf out of the Civil 

o 

War, in i860, swept American commerce from the 
ocean. After that event Mr. Vanderbilt turned his 
attention to the railroad, the great rival of the steam- 
boat and canal. 




Dean Richnaond. 



XVin. THE ERIE CANAL. 

THE second chief factor, in point of time, in the 
building up of New York was the canal. Fulton 
had suggested it as early as 1786, railroads being then 
unthought of. Washington, George Clinton, and El- 
kanah Watson early advocated a canal from Albany to 
the Great Lakes. After the steamboat was invented, 
the fact that boats could be towed by steam from New 
York to Albany, and the slight elevation of the divide 
between the head waters of the Mohawk River and the 
basin of the Great Lakes, no doubt first suggested the 
idea of a canal from Albany to Buffalo, which should 
connect the Lakes with the Atlantic, and give to New 
York the commerce of half a continent. After some 
private agitation the project was brought to the atten- 
tion of the New York legislature in 1810-181 i, but was 
dismissed by that body as being beyond the resources 
of New York, even if the ''big ditch," as its opponents 
termed it in derision, could be dug. In 181 5, however, 
after the war, with the revival of trade and the marvel- 
ous development of the West, the project was revived, 
this time by the merchants of New York, with De Witt 
Clinton, then mayor, afterwards governor, at their head. 
A meeting was held at the City Hall in the autumn of 

18 1 5, at which a committee was appointed, with Mayor 

220 



221 



Clinton as chairman, to prepare a memorial to the in- 
coming legislature on the subject. That memorial, 
written by Clinton, was one of the ablest and most 
far-reaching in its effects of any state paper of the 
period. It pictured in glowing terms the benefits to 
State and city of the 
gigantic undertaking 
It would make tribu- 
tary to them the Great 
Lakes and the empire 
of the Northwest yet to 
be. Boats laden with 
the products of that 
vast region would pass 
through it in endless 
procession. Agriculture 
would build her grana- 
ries, and commerce her 
storehouses, along its 
banks. Great manu- 
factories would spring up. Towns and cities would 
mark its course. 

In addition to these predictions, which time has ful- 
filled in every particular, the paper told the legislators 
how to build the canal, what the cost would be, and 
how money could be raised to meet it. 

A bill chartering it was introduced in the legislature 
of 1817, and at once engaged the attention of the whole 
State. The newspapers were filled with arguments /rt* 
and con. Monster mass meetinfjs in its favor were held 
in New York and along the line of the proposed canal. 




De Witt Clinton. 



222 

In the legislature there was much opposition, but after 
a stormy debate the bill was passed on April 1 7, 
1817. 

On July 4, 181 7, ground was first broken for the 
canal at Rome, midway between the two termini. 
The work was so stupendous that it appealed to the 
imagination of all classes. Most of the right of way 
was given. The wealthy subscribed to the stock ; the 
sturdy yeomen along the line worked with willing hands, 
looking forward to the bridal of the sea and lakes, and 
to the added power and glory of the State. 

By 1820 the middle section, from Utica to Rome, 
ninety-six miles, had been opened. On October i, 
1823, the eastern section, from Utica to Albany, was 
completed, and in 1825 the whole canal was declared 
ready for traffic. The herculean work, that its oppo- 
nents said would require the labor of a generation and 
tax the financial resources of a nation, had been com- 
pleted in a little more than eight years. 

The people determined that its completion should be 
celebrated in a fitting and proper manner. Perhaps 
there was more poetry and sentiment in men's minds 
then than in this utilitarian age, for this celebration 
was certainly one of the most original and dramatic in 
the history of peoples. 

At precisely ten o'clock on the morning of the 26th 
of October, 1825, the waters ©f Lake Erie rushed into 
the canal, and the fleet of canal boats began its journey. 
At the same instant the first signal gun at Buffalo was 
fired. Its report, repeated by relays of cannon, swept 
over the broad reaches of the lake basin to Rochester, 



223 

across the Genesee's flats to Syracuse, over the sixty- 
seven-mile level to Utica, and down the beautiful valley 
of the Mohawk to Albany. At 1 1 A.M. to a moment, the 
grim old veteran standing to his piece at Castleton 
caught the signal gun from Albany, and applied his 
match. Coxsackie caught it at 1 1 : 03, Hudson one 
minute later, Catskill, Upper Red Hook, Rhinebeck, 
and Hyde Park at moment intervals. At 1 1 : 09 it 
reached Poughkeepsie, and the eagles on Storm King 
screamed with joy, thinking war had come again. 
Hamburg, Newburg, West Point, Fort Montgomery, 
Stony Point, Sing Sing, Closters Landing, Fort Wash- 
ington, Fort Gansevoort, the Battery, Fort Lafayette, 
received it in succession and sent it thundering on, the 
last station — Sandy Hook — receiving it at ii : 21 A.M., 
twenty-one minutes after it left Albany, and one hour 
and twenty-one minutes from Buffalo. This did not 
equal the speed of the telegraph, but it was certainly 




Model of a Canal Packet Boat. 



more impressive and romantic. At twenty-two min- 
utes past eleven o'clock Fort Lafayette began the re- 
turn fire, which reached Buffalo at ten minutes before 
one, the sound having traveled over eleven hundred 
miles in less than three hours. 

Let us return to the four pioneer boats which at the 
moment of the inrushing of the waters began theif' 



224 

journey eastward. First came the Seneca Chief, drawn 
by four spirited gray horses in elegant harness, and 
following her, the Superior, the Connnodore Perry, a 
freight boat, and the Buffalo of Erie. They bore as 
invited guests a distinguished company — De Witt Clin- 
ton, then governor of New York, Lieutenant Governor 
Tallmadge, the delegation from New York appointed 
to extend the hospitalities of the city to the distin- 
guished company, and a large number of fair women 
and eminent men. 

As the fleet moved slowly along, the people of the 
entire State seemed to have massed themselves on the 
banks to greet it. 

At Rochester the canal had been carried over the 
Genesee River by a massive stone aqueduct of nine 
arches, each of fifty feet span. At the entrance to this 
a sentinel boat had been stationed, and as the fleet ap- 
proached hailed it. 

" Who comes there ? " 

''Your brothers from the West, on the waters of the 
Great Lakes," was the reply. 

" By what means have they been diverted so far from 
their natural course?" was the next query. 

" Through the channel of the grand Erie Canal." 

** By whose authority and by whom was a work of 
such magnitude accomplished?" asked the voice. 

** By the authority and by the enterprise of the 
people of the State of New York," came the reply. 

The sentinel boat then gave way, and allowed the 
fleet to glide over the aqueduct and enter the spacious 
basin at its eastern end amid the cheers of thousands 



225 

and welcoming salutes of artillery. Similar demonstra- 
tions awaited them all along the line. 

On the morning of November 4 the fleet was 
abreast of the Palisades, with the great city gleaming 
dimly in the mellow autumn haze. An hour later it 
anchored off the city, and soon after was boarded by a 
committee of the common council, which, through its 
spokesman. Alderman Cowdrey, welcomed the party to 
the city. Several hours later a great naval procession 
was formed, and proceeded to the Brooklyn Navy Yard, 
whence, after taking on board officers and guests, it 
steamed out to sea. 

The scene at this moment must have been an ani- 
mated one. There were twenty-nine steam vessels of 
all sorts in line, while the bay was covered with ships, 
frigates, steamers, barges, and other craft, each be- 
decked with bunting from trucks to keelson, and swarm- 
ing with humanity, while both shores, the heights on 
the north and east, and the islands of the harbor were 
covered with applauding spectators. In advance was 
the official steamer WasJiington, with the mayor, cor- 
poration, and distinguished guests on board. As the 
flotilla neared the Narrows it was met by a graceful 
pilot boat, which hailed and announced that it had been 
sent by Neptune to conduct the fleet to his capital. 

That capital at this moment was the United States 
schooner Porpoise, anchored just within Sandy Hook, 
and the fleet proceeded to surround it, forming a cir- 
cle some three miles in circumference. Then Nep- 
tune hailed them from his throne and put the usual 

questions as to whence they came, and their business 
TODD, N. Y. — 15 



226 

there. When he had been satisfied, the last act in the 
pretty drama was performed. Governor CHnton, hand- 
some in face, manly in form, gallant of spirit, standing 




The Ceremony in the Bay. 

in the bow of the Seneca Chief, took a keg of water 
which had been brought from Lake Erie, and holding 
it aloft in full view of all, poured its contents into the 
sea, savin or : 

** This solemnity, at this place, on the first arrival of 
vessels from Lake Erie, is intended to indicate and com- 
memorate the navigable communication which has been 
accomplished between our mediterranean seas and the 
Atlantic Ocean, in about eight years, to the extent of 
more than four hundred and twenty-five miles, by the 
wisdom, public spirit, and energy of the people of the 
State of New York ; and may the God of the heavens 
and the earth smile most propitiously on this work, and 



render it subservient to the best interests of the human 
race." 

Dr. Mitchill then poured into the ocean water from 
the Nile, Indus, Ganges, Thames, and other rivers, and 
the ceremony was complete. 

After the return of the company to the Battery there 
was a great land procession, and the corporation further 
marked the day by issuing a large number of medals 
in gold, silver, and white metal. 

Thus the stupendous work was completed, and began 
its mission of building up a commercial metropolis ; for 
the Erie Canal has been one of the greatest factors in 
the city's marvelous growth, diverting to her most of the 
crude products of the great West, and distributing there 
the myriad commodities imported by her merchants 
from foreign shores. 



XIX. THE RAILROAD. 

SIX years later, in 1831, a competitor appeared 
which in, the course of a generation was destined 
wholly to supersede the canal as a means of passenger 
transportation, and to a large extent in the moving of 
freight, although the lower freight tariff by water still 
makes the influence of the canal felt. In 1831 the 
first railroad in New York, and one of the first in the 
United States, was opened between Albany and Sche- 
nectady. 

A year later, April 24, 1832, was chartered the first 
great trunk line, the Erie, designed to open communica- 
tion between the city of New York and the Great 
Lakes through the southern counties of the State. It 
was not until 1 851, however, that this colossal enter- 
prise was completed, and New York connected by rail- 
road with the prairies of the West. 

During the same period the Mohawk and Hudson 
Railroad had been pushing westward from Albany, 
under various names, up the Mohawk valley, side by side 
with the canal, until in 1854, by the completion of the 
Buffalo and Lockport Railroad, it formed a continuous 
line of rail from Albany to Buffalo. These various 
roads had been consolidated into one in 1853, under the 
name of the New York Central Railroad. The latter 

228 



229 

was consolidated with the Hudson River Railroad, from 
New York to Albany, in 1869, under the title of the 
New York Central and Hudson River Railroad, the two 
roads forming the second great trunk line between New 
York and the West. Two years later the Pennsylvania 
Railroad, which had been opened from Philadelphia 
to Pittsburg in 1854, secured control of the united 
railways of New Jersey, and formed the third great 
trunk line. There have since been added the Balti- 
more and Ohio, the Delaware, Lackawanna and West- 
ern, the Lehigh Valley, and the West Shore, making in 
all seven trunk lines connecting New York with the West 
and South. These seven great highways, with her 
waterways, her geographical position, and her unex- 
celled harbor, must assure to New York future com- 
mercial supremacy, provided her merchants have the 
foresight and energy to take advantage of them. 



;"'"'; ":'!!■.■'•■;"•':;:;;!•"' 



XX. TYPICAL NEW YORK MERCHANTS. 

IN the winter of 1 784 there arrived in Baltimore a 
fair-haired German youth of twenty-one, with a 
small stock of goods which he had bought in London. 
He had no other capital except thrift, energy, good 
habits, and an invincible determination to succeed. His 

name was John Jacob 
Astor. He had met on 
shipboard a fellow-coun- 
trvman,bv trade a furrier, 
who told him of the busi- 
ness opportunities of the 
fur trade even for men 
of small capital, and the 
young adventurer deter- 
mined to become a fur 
merchant. 

He accordingly came 
on to New York, sold his 




John Jacob Astor. 



goods, and with the proceeds purchased furs, which were 
bought of the Indians and trappers, who still came to 
New York to sell the products of their winter's toil. 
With these he went to London, sold them at a large 
profit, and returned to New York with the purpose of 
learning all that could be learned about the fur business. 



23a 



231 

First he apprenticed himself to a furrier and mastered 
the mechanical part of the trade. A few years later he 
opened a store of his own. But he was not long con- 
tent with a retail tradesman's position. His inquiring 
and comprehensive mind reached out after the fur trade 
of North America, which at this time was nearly as 
valuable to the English as the gold and silver of South 
American mines had been to the Spanish. 

He found that the central mart of furs in North 
America was Montreal, Canada. All the trade in furs 
of that vast region stretching from the Great Lakes to 
the head waters of the Mississippi and Missouri, later 
called the Northwest, had been' first carried on by the 
French traders of Canada, when that country belonged 
to France. After the British conquest the trade of 
course fell to Englishmen. 

This territory, he found, was now (1790) covered by 
three great rival companies : the Hudson Bay Com- 
pany, chartered in 1670 by Charles H., and given exclu- 
sive right to trap and trade in the region watered by. 
Hudson Bay and its tributaries; the Northwest Com- 
pany, founded in 1787, which controlled by its fortified 
trading posts the whole region of the upper lakes ; and 
the Mackinaw Company, younger in years, whose head- 
quarters were on Mackinac Island, at the mouth of Lake 
Michigan, and whose posts cordoned the latter lake and 
stretched along the Fox and Wisconsin rivers and across 
to the very head waters of the Mississippi. The fur- 
bearing animals, such as the beaver, mink, otter, fox, 
wolf, and muskrat, were then trapped by the Indians and 
half-breeds, and their pelts conveyed to the company's 



232 

forts to be exchanged for powder, ball, firearms, blankets, 
trinkets, calicoes, and other goods attractive to the 
Indian. 

Then, once a year, with the high water of spring, 
great fleets of canoes and boats, filled with goods, would 
set out from Montreal, ascend the Ottawa River, and 
thence by other rivers and portages reach Lakes Huron 
and Superior and the most distant posts, exchange 
their goods for furs, and return with the latter to 
Montreal. 

Having possessed himself of these details, our merchant 
determined as soon as he could to enter into this country 
himself; but for the present he was content to buy his 
furs in Montreal and ship them thence direct to London, 
Canada being at that time forbidden to trade with any 
but the mother country. In 1795, however, England 
made a treaty with us which allowed our merchants 
to trade direct with Canada, and from that time Mr. 
Astor's furs were sent direct to New York. Some cf 
them were reshipped to Europe, some sold at home, 
but the most of them were sent to China, our merchant 
being a pioneer in the China trade, which later became 
so extensive and profitable. The Chinese prized furs 
highly and were willing to pay handsomely for them. 
Mr. Astor would therefore ship his cargoes of fur to 
Canton, and bring back in return tea, silks, chinaware, 
fireworks, nankeens, and other commodities. These 
ventures proved immensely profitable, and he was soon 
in a position to set in motion his scheme of an Ameri- 
can fur company in the Northwest. 

The Mackinaw Company, under British control, con- 



^?>?> 



ducted its operations almost wholly in United States 
territory. Mr. Astor now decided to occupy this field, 
and instead of bringing his furs half across a continent 
and then shipping them around Cape Horn to China, 
to ship them direct from a port on the Pacific Ocean. 
Our government, then under the statesmanlike Jeffer- 
son, heartily approved of this plan, as it had long viewed 
with alarm the influence possessed by alien trappers 
and traders over the Indian tribes in our territory. 

In 1809 the State of New York chartered the Ameri- 
can Fur Company, with a capital of one million dollars, 
with power to increase it to two million. This company 
was really John Jacob Astor, he owning all of its stock 
and controlling its movements ; but he wished the 
authority of a State charter in order to cope with the 
Mackinaw Company, a wealthy and powerful corpora- 
tion. He at once entered the field against the latter 
company, but the rivalry proved so intense, and the 
collisions between the partisans of the two companies so 
frequent, that in 181 i he bought out the rival company. 
He would now, no doubt, have been very successful 
had not the war of 18 12 with England broken out and 
stopped further operations by calling the hunters and 
trappers on both sides to arms. 

He had previously conceived a grander scheme, that 
of carrying out his project of a fur company on the 
Pacific coast. In 18 10, you must remember, the vast 
region now occupied by the great States of Oregon, 
Washington, Idaho, and Wyoming was an unknown 
wilderness. The famous navigator Captain Cook, dur- 
ing his last voyage, i 776-1 779, had skirted the Pacific 



234 

shore and reported the presence there of sea otter in 
hirge numbers. Now, the fur of this animal was highly 
I)rized in China, and by 1791 there were a score of 
vessels, chiefly from Boston and Salem, on this coast 
collecting sea otter fur. One of these vessels, the 
Coluiiibia, Captain Gray, of Boston, had discovered the 
great estuary of the Columbia, and had sailed up that 
river for some distance. Captain Gray calling it after 
his vessel, the Columbia; but none had ever ascended 
to its fountain-head amid the eternal snows of the 
Rocky Mountains, a thousand miles inland. This re- 
gion was virgin soil. No organized company had ever 
obtained a foothold there, for the posts of the Russian 
Fur Company were far to the northward. Mr. Astor 
now proposed to establish a colony of trappers and 
traders at the mouth of the Columbia, with posts 
stretching back to its sources and up and down the 
coast, the whole to be supplied by his vessels, which 
would receive in return the furs gathered by the trap- 
pers, convey them to China, and there load with return 
cargoes for New York. 

This plan he proceeded to execute with his accus- 
tomed energy. With Mr. Wilson Hunt of New Jersey 
and others he formed the Pacific Fur Company, and dis- 
patched a large ship, the Toiujuin, around the Horn with 
everything necessary for a colony and for the Indian 
trade. Three of his partners sailed in the ship, with a 
number of colonists. They built a village at the mouth 
of the Columbia, which they called Astoria, after the 
founder, and the enterprise seemed destined to succeed. 

But it was the victim of a series of misfortunes, which 



^35 

in the end led its founder to relinquish it. First, the 
Tonqitiii was captured by the Indians while on a trad- 
ing voyage to the northward, and all of her crew except 
five, who managed to escape, were massacred. To 
avenge their loss, Mr. Lewis, the supercargo, who had 
been seriously wounded and left on the ship, blew her 
up while the Indians were dancing and feasting on 
board. 

Mr. Hunt, who had left Montreal in August, 1810, 
with a large party, to come overland, reached his des- 
tination only after enduring incredible hardships and 
suffering the loss of everything but life itself. A 
second ship, sent out in 181 1, found the little colony 
at Astoria in good health and spirits, and the trading 
posts which had been established well equipped and 
prosperous. But the outbreak of the war soon after led 
Mr. Astor to sell his whole interest on the Pacific coast 
to the Northwest Company for about half its value. 
You will find the whole romantic and interesting story 
of this enterprise graphically told in Washington Irving's 
** Astoria." 

Mr. Astor's later ventures were not of such national 
importance, although they reached to the remotest 
seas. He retired from commercial life about twenty 
years before his death, and devoted himself to the 
care of his real estate interests, which had grown to 
large proportions. His tastes were scholarly, and at 
his modest mansion, which stood on the site of the 
present Astor House, he delighted to gather about 
him the scholars and literary men of his day. One of 
these was Washington Irving, a handsome, graceful 



236 

youth, a lawyer without briefs, who in i S09 awoke one 
morning to find himself famous as the author of the 
" History of New York, by Diedrich Knickerbocker." 
Another of these guests was Fitz- Greene Halleck, the 
poet w^hose " Marco Bozzaris " you have so often de- 
claimed, and who w^as employed in Mr. Astor's counting- 
house. On his death in 1848 Mr. Astor still further 
showed his regard for letters by leaving three hundred 
and fifty thousand dollars for the endowment of the 
Astor Library. 

We have given his story somewhat in detail as show- 
ing what enterprises of moment were undertaken by 
New York merchants in those days. 

Another striking venture of this period was that of the 
good ship Betsey^ which in 1797 was sent on a voyage 
round the world by a company of New York merchants, 
with a view of discovering commercial openings in the 
South Seas and Pacific Ocean. The Betsey had been gone 
two years when, in 1799, she suddenly appeared in the 
Narrows, and sailed up to her berth at the Fly Market 
wharf, filled to her hatches with tea, silk, chinaware, 
cassia, and nankeens, and with her crew of healthy 
young sailors paraded on deck, clad in jackets of China 
silk, yellow nankeen trousers, and bleached chip hats 
trimmed with blue ribbons. Every man before the 
mast received one thousand dollars and costly silks for 
his share of the venture, while the profits of the prin- 
cipals were fabulous. This voyage led to the rich trade 
of New York with the Orient. 

There were many other great merchants of a later 
period. Howland & Aspinwall were prominent from 



237 

1 83 1 to 1840. They were the pioneers in the Pacific 
trade, and did the largest general business of any firm, 
with the Mediterranean, England, the East and West 
Indies. They owned a fleet of seventeen or eighteen 
ships, among them several Liverpool packets. A single 
cargo of theirs sent to the Pacific coast of South America 













^:^jm: yj^^^^r" !^^ 



Broadway. 1840. 

was often worth two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, 
and comprised pretty much everything from a cambric 
needle to a hoop pole, the minor articles being packed 
in small barrels to go on mules' backs over the Andes. 
For this firm was built one of the first of the famous 
clipper ships to sail out of New York, as will be more 
fully narrated in a subsequent chapter. 

N. L. & G. Griswold were the greatest China mer- 
chants of this period. Their ship would sail from New 
York in May with a cargo of ginseng, spelter, lead, iron, 
etc., worth thirty thousand dollars, and one hundred and 
seventy thousand Spanish dollars in specie, reach 
Whampoa, the port of Canton, in due time, be loaded 
by her supercargo in two months with tea, chinaware, 
and cassia, or false cinnamon, but principally with tea, 
and return to New York within the year. The tea cost 
thirty-seven cents a pound in China, and paid a duty in 



238 

New York of seventy-five cents a pound. The first cost 
of a cargo was about $200,000 ; the duties and expenses 
raised it to $600,000. The cargo would be sold to the 
wholesale dealer for $700,000, the merchants taking his 
notes for four and six months. But the duties were not 
payable until nine, twelve, and sometimes eighteen 
months after entry, so that the importer had the use of 
nearly $400,000 for that period, in addition to his 
profit of $100,000 on a cargo. 

This was the usual course pursued by the other great 
China merchants, Astor, Grinnell, Minturn & Co., A. A. 
Low & Brother, Thomas H. Smith & Sons, and others. 
By and by Smith & Sons failed, owing the governrhent 
about three million dollars in unpaid duties. The loss 
of this amount led to a change in the system. 

Other great merchants, whose names were towers of 
strength on 'change, were Goodhue, Aymar, Fish, King, 
Boorman, and Stewart. Henry Grinnell of Grinnell, 
Minturn & Co., became famous for his interest in arctic 
exploration, and in 1850 fitted out at his own expense 
an expedition to go in search of Sir John Franklin, 
which discovered and named after him Grinnells Land, 
in latitude 75° 24' 21" N. 

The founders of these great houses were in almost all 
cases poor boys from the New England States or from 
foreign countries. So often was this the case that it 
was the subject of general remark. A shrewd observer, 
Walter Barrett, in his " Old Merchants of New York," 
thus wrote : 

*' It is a singular fact that a foreign-born boy or one 
from the New England States will succeed in this city 



239 

and become a partner In our largest firms much oftener 
than a born New York boy. The great secret of their 
success is their perfect wilHngness to be useful and do 
what they are required to do, and cJicerfnlly. Take, for 
instance, such a firm as Grinnell, Minturn & Co. In 
their countingroom they have New York boys and 
New England boys. 

*' Moses H. Grinnell comes down in the morning and 
says to John, a New York boy, * John, take my overcoat 
up to my house in Fifth Avenue.' John takes the coat, 
mutters something about, 'I'm not an errand boy; I 
came here to learn the business,' and moves reluctantly. 
Mr. Grinnell sees it. At the same time one of his New 
England boys says, * I'll take it up.' * That's right; do 
so,' replies Mr. Grinnell, and to himself he says, 'That 
boy is smart, will work,' and he gives him plenty to do. 
Very soon he gets promoted, gains the confidence of 
the chief clerk and of his employers, and eventually gets 
into the firm as partner. 

" It's so all over the city. It's so in every store, 
countingroom, and office. Outside boys get on faster 
than New York boys, owing to two reasons — they are 
not afraid to work, or to run of errands, or do cheer- 
fully what they are told to do, and they do their work 
quickly." 

There are golden grains of wisdom in the above for 
town boys and country boys alike. 



XXL SHIPS AND SAILORS. 

VERY soon after the centering In New York of the 
great highways described in a previous chapter, 
there were founded ocean hnes to distribute throughout 
the known world the products they brought. 

The first of these shipping enterprises of moment was 
the famous packet service between New York and Liver- 
pool, England, founded in 1816 by five New York mer- 
chants — Isaac Wright & Son, Benjamin Marshall, Fran- 
cis Thompson, and Jeremiah Thompson. Up to that date 
the merchantmen, which also carried passengers, were 
of French and British ownership, slow sailers, with dingy, 
shabby passenger appointments, and with no regular 
hour of sailing, leaving when loaded, or when wind and 
tide served. These men saw that ships unrivaled for 
size, strength, speed, and beauty, and sailing on a regu- 
lar schedule would take the cream of the traffic, and 
founded the famous Black Ball line, still a fountain of 
happy memories to the old sea captains and merchants 
who haunt the docks and shipping offices about South 
Street and Burling Slip, or, safely moored in the Sailors' 
Snug Harbor, talk of past glories and adventures. 

At first this line boasted but four ships, later in- 
creased to twelve, each a thing of beauty and an object 

of pride to the American heart. One of them sailed 

240 



241 

regularly on the ist of every month. They were so 
successful that in 1821 a rival line, the Red Star, was 
established by Byrnes, Grimble & Co., with four ships, 
and sailing on the 24th of every month. To outdo 
them the Black Ball line added four new ships, and ad- 
vertised a sailing on the 1st and i6th of every month. 
Then began an era of shipbuilding and mercantile ex- 
pansion and competition such as the port had never 
seen. 

Fish, Grinnell & Co. and Thaddeus Phelps & Co. soon 
founded the Swallowtail line, so called from its forked 
pennant, with departures on the 8th of every month, 
and New York papers proudly boasted of a weekly 
packet service to Liverpool. All these packets, you 
must understand, were gallant ships of from six hun- 
dred to fifteen hundred tons burden, and made the pas- 
sage out from New York in twenty-three days, and the 
return in forty. Once the Canada of the Black Ball 
line broke the record by making the outward run in 
fifteen days and eighteen hours. In 1823 Grinnell, 
Minturn & Co. established a London line with sailings 
once a month. A line witli four ships to Havre, 
France, was established about 1822 by Francis Depau. 

These packets did much to build up the city by 
shortening and cheapening intercourse between her and 
European ports, and by driving the clumsy French and 
English traders from the seas they threw the carrying 
trade into American bottoms. They were also very 
profitable to their captains, agents, and builders, for each 
owned a share. By and by the rivalry became so 
keen that larger ships were built, the Palestine and 

TODU, N. Y. — 16 



242 

A)na£on, of eighteen hundred tons each, being the 
largest as well as the last of their class. It is a tradi- 
tion of South Street that the Amazon once made the 
voyage to Portsmouth, England, in fourteen days, a 
great feat for a sailing vessel, although the Patrick 




A Clipper. 



Henry, the Montezuma, the Independence, and the 
SontJiampton had performed the voyage to Liverpool 
in the same period. 

lUit the packets were destined to be eclipsed in 
beauty and speed by a new model, also distinctly 
American — the clippers. These originated in Baltimore 
(according to some authorities ; others say in New York) 
about 1840, in answer to a demand of the tea merchants 
for swift ships, even though of less carrying capacity. 
It was found that tea lost in flavor and other qualities 



243 

with each additional day spent at sea ; besides, a cargo 
was of such immense value that every day represented 
a large sum in interest and insurance — hence the 
demand for swift ships. Tlie first clippers, built in 
New York by Smith & Dimon, were ordered by those 
famous China merchants, William H. Aspinwall, N. L. 
& G. Griswold, and A. A. Low & Brother, and were 
small, swift vessels of from six hundred to nine hundred 
tons burden. 

The California gold excitement of 1849 created a 
demand for larger ships, and ushered in the golden 
age of the clippers. Provisions and machinery for the 
mines, passengers' baggage and outfits, were to be 
forwarded as far as San Francisco, half the distance 
to China, and created a demand for larger carrying 
capacity. New York shipbuilders were equal to the 
demand. The CJiallcngc of 2,000 tons, the Invincible 
of 2,150 tons, the Comet of 1,209 tons, the Szvord Fish 
of 1,150 tons, with the Tornado, the Flying Clond, the 
Black Squall, and the Sovereign of the Seas, soon 
appeared, and were triumphs of the shipbuilder's art. 

Mr. Sheldon, in an article on the old clippers in 
** Harper's Magazine " for January, 1884, has given so 
spirited an account of the exploits of these vessels that 
we cannot do better than quote an extract : 

*' That clipper epoch was an epoch to be proud of ; 
and we were proud of it. The New York newspapers 
abounded in such headlines in large type as these: 
* Quickest Trip on Record,' ' Shortest Passage to San 
Francisco,' ' Unparalleled Speed,' * Quickest Voyage 
Yet,' ' A Clipper as is a Clipper,' * Extraordinary 



244 

Dispatch,' * The Quickest Voyage to China,' ' The Con- 
test of the Chppers,' ' Great Passage from San Fran- 
cisco,' ' Race Round the World.' The cHpper ship 
Surprise, built in East Boston by ]\Ir. Hall, and owned 
by A. A. Low & Brother, having sailed to San Fran- 
cisco in ninety-six days, then the shortest time on 
record (Mr. W. H. Aspinwall's Sea WitcJi had run the 
course in ninety-seven days), a San Francisco journal 
said : * One of our most distin^fuished merchants made a 
bet with a friend some weeks since that the Surprise 
would make the passage in ninety- six days, just the time 
she has consumed to a day. Yesterday morning, full 
of confidence, he mounted his old nag and rode over to 
the North Beach to get the first glimpse of the looked- 
for clipper. The fog, however, w^as rather thick out- 
side, and after looking awhile he turned back to town, 
but had not arrived at his countingroom before he heard 
that the Surprise had passed the Golden Gate, and by 
eleven o'clock Captain Dumaresq was in his old friend's 
countingroom on Sansome Street. She has brought 
eighteen hundred tons of cargo, which may be esti- 
mated at a value of two hundred thousand dollars. 
Her manifest is twenty-five feet long.' 

** Her greatest run was two hundred and eighty-four 
miles in twenty-four hours, and she reefed her topsails 
but twice during the voyage of 16,308 miles. She soon 
left San Francisco for London by way of Canton, and 
on reaching the English capital her receipts for freights 
had entirely paid her cost and running expenses, be- 
sides netting her owners a clear profit of fifty thousand 
dollars. At Canton her freight for London was engaged 



245 

at six pounds sterling a ton, while the English ships 
were taking the same freight at three and four pounds 
a ton ; and this was the second season that the prefer- 
ence had been given to American ships at adv^anced 
rates, their shorter passages enabling shippers to re- 
ceive prompt returns from their investments, to save 
interest, and to secure an early market." 

From this time (1850) until the Civil War, in i860, 
swept American shipping from the seas, there were 
many famous contests between rival clippers. In 1850 
the HowqiiUy Captain Daniel McKenzie, made the trip 
from Shanghai to New York in eighty-eight days. 
The Samuel Russell, on her homeward voyage from 
Whampoa, China, in 1851, made three hundred and 
eighteen miles in a single day, — thirteen and a quarter 
miles an hour, — a greater speed than any ocean steamer 
had at that time attained. For thirty days in succession 
she averaged two hundred and twenty-six miles a day. 
On another voyage to Canton she sailed three hundred 
and twenty-eight miles in one day, and on her return 
to New York reported her own arrival out at Canton. 
Both vessels were owned by A. A. Low & Brother of 
New York. The Flying Cloud, Captain Josiah P. Creesy, 
made the voyage to San Francisco in eighty-four days, 
distancing that of the Surprise by twelve days. 

Such were some of the triumphs of American clip- 
pers a half century ago. Steamships, however, soon 
became formidable rivals, and with the invention of the 
screw propeller have nearly driven the clippers from 
the sea. Some of the former, with their exploits, it 
will be interesting to describe. 



246 

The first steamer to cross the Atlantic was an Ameri- 
can vessel, the Savaujia/i, which sailed from Savannah, 
Georgia, on May 26, 18 19, for Liverpool, England. 
She was built in New York, having been launched in 
August, 1 8 18, as a sailing packet to run between New 
York and Liverpool. As she came from the ways she 
was bought by several gentlemen of Savannah, and, at 
the suggestion of Captain Moses Rogers, fitted up as 
a steamer, with paddle wheels so contrived that they 
could be unshipped and shipped at pleasure. Her 
masts and rigging were retained, her owners not having 
full confidence in her ability to make her way wholly 
by steam. 

She made her trial trip from New York to Savannah 
and back in April, 18 19, using both steam and sail, and 
on her return to Savannah, in May of the same year, her 
owners determined to send her overseas to Li\erpool. 
Her commander was Captain Moses Rogers, her navi- 
gator Stephen Rogers, both natives of New London, 
Connecticut. She carried in her bunkers seventy-five 
tons of coal and twenty-five cords of wood, and made 
the passage in twenty-six days — eight days under steam 
and eighteen under sail. 

Stephen Rogers, her navigator, in a letter to the New^ 
London " Gazette," wrote that the SavanuaJi was first 
sighted from the telegraph station at Cape Clear, on the 
southern coast of Ireland, which reported her as being 
on fire, whereupon the admiral sent a king's cutter to 
her relief. " But cfreat was their wonder at their inabil- 
ity to come up with a ship under bare poles. After 
several shots had been fired from the cutter the engine 



247 

was stopped, and the surprise of the cutter's crew at the 
mistake they had made, as well as their curiosity to see 
the strange Yankee craft, can be easily imagined." 

As she steamed up the Mersey to Liverpool the 
wharves, shipping, and roofs of the houses were crowded 
with people, anxious to see the steamship that had 
crossed the ocean ; and while she remained there she 
was visited by great crowds, including merchants and 
shipbuilders, who asked many questions as to her per- 
formances. 

From Liverpool she proceeded to St. Petersburg, 
calling at Stockholm on her way, where she was visited 
by the King of Sweden, and also by " the American 
minister and lady, and all the foreign ministers and 
their ladies." She sailed from St. Petersburg on Octo- 
ber lo, 1 8 19, and reached Savannah on November 30 of 
the same year. 

The results of her voyage did not encourage her 
owners to continue her as a steamship, however. Her 
boiler, engines, and paddles were removed, and she was 
placed on the Savannah route as a packet ship, and was 
finally wrecked on the Long Island coast. 

Other successful attempts were made to cross the 
Atlantic by steam, but the cost was too great, and the 
" steam ferry " cannot be said to have been successfully 
established until the voyages of the Siriiis, which sailed 
from Cork, Ireland, April 4, 1838, and reached New 
York on April 23 ; and of the Great Western, which 
sailed from Bristol, England, four days after the Sirins, 
and arrived in New York the same day, but a few hours 
later. 



248 

These boats belonged to rival companies, that had 
recently been formed to navigate the ocean by steam. 
The SiriHS was sent out bv the British and North 
American Company, which had been organized in 
London, only after great opposition from the owners 
of sailing vessels and others, by Dr. Junius Smith, 
an American scientist and inventor. This company 
forthwith contracted with Curling & Young of Black- 
wall for a " large and splendid steamship," the British 
Qticcn, of seventeen hundred tons burden, and de- 
signed expressly for the New York and London trade. 
Later her design was changed to twenty-four hundred 
tons. 

Meantime a rival company, the Great Western Steam- 
ship Company, had been formed at the suggestion 
of Mr. Brussel, a famous engineer. This company 
began building the Great Western, of thirteen hundred 
and twenty tons, to ply between Bristol and New York. 
The British Queen was delayed by the nondelivery of 
her engines, and her owners, fearing that the rival com- 
pany would send their Great Western first into the field 
and win the coveted honor of making the initial voyage 
across the Atlantic, chartered the Siriiis and sent her 
out, with the result above described. 

The British Queen was finally completed, and made 
her maiden voyage in July, 1839, crossing from London 
to New York in fourteen and a half days without mis- 
hap or detention. The success of these steamers led 
the companies which owned them to build others, and 
soon there were lines of steamers leaving New York 
and London or Liverpool regularly. A prospectus of 



249 

the British and American Steam Navigation Company 
issued in the summer of 1838 assured the pubhc that 
in 1839 they would be able to dispatch steamers for 
New York on the ist and i6th of each month from 
London and Liv^erpool alternately. 

In 1839-1840 Samuel Cunard, an enterprising mer- 
chant of Halifax, Nova Scotia, founded the famous 
Cunard line, which has been in steady operation ever 
since, dispatching vessels regularly from New York, 
Boston, and Halifax. 



XXII. NEW YORK IN THE CIVIL WAR. 

THROUGH the exciting days of 1860-1861, when 
war and rumors of war filled the air, the voice of 
New York was for peace. A commercial community, 
she was naturally conservative, and averse to a change. 
War would destroy her commerce. Debts to the 
amount of millions of dollars were due her from 
Southern merchants. War would confiscate every 
dollar. Naturally, as the great conflict drew near, her 
merchants made the most serious efi"orts to ward it ofi^. 
On January 12, 1861, a memorial signed by hundreds 
of her business men was sent to Congress, praying that 
the pending troubles might be settled by peaceful 
means. On the 18th another memorial of the same 
tenor, with forty thousand names attached, was in- 
dorsed at a meeting held in the Chamber of Commerce, 
and forwarded to Washington. Later a mass meeting 
was held in Cooper Institute, at which three delegates 
were appointed to confer with representatives of the six 
States that had already seceded, with a view to healing 
the breach by concession and compromise. At the 
same meeting, with the same object, a Peace Society 
was formed, with the venerable Professor S. F. B. Morse, 
the inventor of the telegraph, as president. 

Then came April 12, 1861. The old flag was fired 

250 



251 

on at Fort Sumter, and fell dishonored before the 
palmetto standard. In a moment the current of popu- 
lar feeling in New York changed. Self-interest with- 
ered. Patriotism revived and became uppermost. 
Democrats vied with Republicans in sentiments of 
loyalty to the flag. Eight days after, at a great mass 
meeting held in Union Square, Fernando Wood, then 
ma3^or, in an eloquent speech, declared that ** the Union 
must and shall be preserved," notwithstanding that 
the Januar}' previous he had sent a message to the 
common council proposing that the city of New York 
herself secede from the rest of the State. The air was 
electric with military ardor and patriotic enthusiasm. 
Regiments mustered in their armories, or marched 
through the streets to the sound of drum, fife, and 
bugle, on their way to the front. The great poet of the 
city, Bryant, expressed the feeling of all when he wrote : 

*' Lay down the ax, fling by the spade, 

Leave in its track the toiling plow : 
The rifle and the bayonet blade 

For arms like yours are fitter now. 
And let the hands that ply the pen 

Quit the light task, and learn to wield 
Tht horseman's crooked brand, and rein 

The charger on the battlefield." 

On the 1 8th of April, 1861, the gallant Sixth Massa- 
chusetts marched through the city on its way to the 
imperiled capital, and added to the excitement. The 
Rev. Dr. Dix, an eyewitness, thus described the attend- 
ant scenes : 

** They came in at night, and it was imderstood that 



252 

after breakfast at the Astor House the march would be 
resumed. IW nine next morning an immense crowd 
had assembled about the hotel. Broadway from Bar- 
clay to Fulton Street, and the lower end of Park Row, 
were occupied by a dense mass of human beings, all 
watching the front entrance, at which the regiment was 
to file out. From side to side, from wall to wall, ex- 
tended that innumerable host, silent as the grave, ex- 
pectant, something unspeakable in their faces. It was 
the dread, deep hush before the thunderstorm. At last 
a low murmur was heard ; it sounded somewhat like the 
gasp of men in suspense, and the cause was that the sol- 
diers had appeared, their leading files descending the 
steps. By the twinkle of their bayonets above the 
heads of the crowd their course could be traced out into 
the open street in front. Formed at last in column 
they stood, the band at the head, and the word was 
given, ' March.' Still a dead silence prevailed. Then 
the drums rolled out the time, the regiment was in 
motion, and then the band, bursting into full volume, 
struck up — what other tune could the Massachusetts 
men have chosen? — 'Yankee Doodle.' 

" I caught about two bars and a half of the old tune, 
not more, for instantly there rose a sound such as many 
a man never heard in his life, and never will hear, such 
as is never heard more than once in a lifetime. Not 
more awful is the thunder of heaven, as with solemn 
peal it smites into silence all lesser sounds, and rolling 
through the vault above us, fills earth and sky with the 
shock of its terrible voice. One terrific roar burst from 
the multitude, leaving nothing audible save its own 



253 

reverberation. We saw the heads of armed men, the 
gleam of their weapons, the regimental colors, all mov- 
ing on pageantlike, but naught could we hear save that 
one hoarse, heavy surge, one general acclaim, one wild 
shout of joy and hope, one endless cheer, rolling up and 
down, from side to side, above, below, to right, to left 




Departure of the Seventh Regiment, 1861. 

— the voice of approval, of consent, of unity in act and 
will. No one who saw and heard could doubt how 
New York was going." 

The famous Seventh Regiment, the pride of New 
York, was but a few hours behind, marching at 3 P.M. 
on the 19th, nine hundred and ninety-one men strong. 
" Was there ever such an ovation? " wrote the poet and 
soldier Fitz-James O'Brien, who was one of them. 



254 

" The marble walls of Broadway were never before 
rent with such cheers as greeted us when we passed. 
The facades of the buildings were so thick with people 
that it seemed as if an army of black ants were march- 
ing, after their resistless fashion, through the city, and 
had scaled the houses. Handkerchiefs fluttered in the 
air like myriads of white butterflies. An avenue of 
brave, honest faces smiled upon us as we passed, and 
sent a sunshine into our hearts that lives there still." 

Next day the Sixth, Twelfth, and Seventy- first em- 
barked for Washington by way of Fortress Monroe, to 
avoid Baltimore, where the Massachusetts men had met 
resistance, and on April 23 the Eighth, Thirteenth, 
Twenty-eighth, and Sixty-ninth took up the line of 
march. 

Meantime the city authorities and the citizens had not 
been idle. The common council appropriated one 
million dollars to aid in carrying on the war. Gener- 
ous private subscriptions were given to equip and care 
for the soldiers. Thirteen banks in New York alone 
gave nearly one million dollars. In ten days New York 
citv sent eicfht thousand men to the front. 

To care for these troops and their families, defend 
the city, and aid the government, a Union Defense 
Committee was soon organized, with the Hon. John A. 
Dix, who had been a member of President Buchanan's 
cabinet, as chairman. This committee during the war 
aided in organizing and equipping forty-nine regiments, 
containing some forty thousand men, and disbursed a 
million dollars in aiding the city's soldiers and their 
families. 



255 

The loyal women of the city, not to be outdone by 
their brothers, organized, in 1861, a Woman's Central 
Relief Association, which soon had branches in all of 
the Northern States. The ladies, however, found that 
they needed government aid and sanction to render 
their society effective, and at their request Secretary of 
War Stanton created the United States Sanitary Com- 
mission, " for inquiry and advice in respect to the 
sanitary needs of the United States forces." This 
commission comprised six competent gentlemen, with 
the Rev. Henry W. Bellows, a famous Unitarian clergy- 
man of New York, as president, and under its authority 
the ladies, with rare energy and enthusiasm, worked. 
It is said that the New York branch collected and sent 
to the army during the four years of war fifteen million 
dollars' worth of supplies and five million dollars in 
money. The same year, following the suggestion of 
Mr. Vincent Colyer, a well-known artist, the Christian 
Commission was organized in New York, to attend to 
the moral and spiritual welfare of the soldiers. Shortly 
before this Miss Dorothea L. Dix had offered her serv- 
ices to the government as a nurse in the hospitals, and 
became the head of the American Order of Florence 
Nightingales, a body of devoted women, who served 
their country quite as faithfully by loving and gratuitous 
service in the hospitals as did their brothers on the 
field. 

In May, 1863, there came sad reverses to the Union 
arms. Hooker had been defeated by Lee at Chancel- 
lorsville, and the latter had carried the war into Africa 
by invading Pennsylvania. To fill up our decimated 



256 

armies, President Lincoln, tlie same month, ordered a 
draft of three hundred thousand men. There was at 
this time a great body of evil-disposed men in New York, 
with whom the war was unpopular, and who had sworn 
to resist such a draft if ordered. This the State and 
city authorities knew perfectly well, but no steps seem 
to have been taken to guard against such an uprising; 
instead the city as well as the State militia was hur- 
ried off to swell the armies confronting Lee. Only the 
police force, a handful of regulars, and a few members 
of the invalid corps were left. The draft was ordered 
for Saturday, July 1 1, 1863, and began in the Eleventh 
and Ninth districts, without disturbance of any sort. 
Next day, Sunday, seems to have been used to foment 
trouble. 

On Monday morning the wheel was set in motion at 
the enrolling offices at 677 Third Avenue and 1190 
Broadway, and the draft continued until noon, w^hen it 
was stopped because of disturbances in the city. At 
about ten o'clock that morning John A. Kennedy, 
superintendent of police, was set upon by the rioters 
at the corner of Lexington Avenue and Forty-sixth 
Street, and would probably have been beaten to death 
but for the aid of an influential friend. Almost instantly 
the mob grew to threatening proportions, and surrounded 
the Police Headquarters on Mulberry Street in a mena- 
cing way. President Acton at once took command, and 
by telegraph called out the entire police force, which 
assembled at its respective station houses, and for three 
days struggled with the greatly superior forces of the 
mob. Third Avenue at this time, from Cooper Institute 



257 



to Forty-sixth Street, was black with human beings. 
Many other streets presented a similar appearance. 
Small bodies of police, when encountered, wxre driven 
off or trampled under foot. Growing bolder, the 
rioters broke open stores, fired houses, and inaugurated 
a carnival of crime. 

The negroes they hated especially, because they con- 
sidered that they 
were the cause of 
the war. These, 
wherever found, 
whether men, 
women, or chil- 
dren, were seized 
and hanged to 
the nearest lamp- 
posts. By and 
by a large body 
of the rioters 
swooped down 
upon the Colored 
Orphan Asylum, 
on Fifth Avenue, 
between Forty- 
third and Forty-fourth streets. Two hundred helpless 
children were gathered there, but while the mob was 
breaking in the front doors, they were hurried out by 
the rear, and found safety in neighboring houses. The 
rioters, finding that their prey had escaped, applied the 
torch to the house in twenty places at once, and burned 
it to the ground. 

TODD, N. Y. — 17 




The Draft Riot. 



258 

Five thousand men now set out for Police Head- 
quarters, breathing threats of slaughter against the 
police. To meet thern President Acton detailed two 
hundred men, under Sergeant Daniel Carpenter, who 
proved himself an able commander as well as a brave 
soldier. Sending detachments up the parallel streets, 
he led a column down Bleecker Street to Broadway, and 
charged the mob in front, while the detachments took 
them in flank and rear, and scattered them like chaff. 

That night it became evident that the situation was 
critical, and Mayor Opdyke called on General Wool, 
commanding the regulars, for aid, and also on General 
Sandford, commanding the State National Guard. 
Wool detailed Colonel Harvey Brown, of the Fifth 
Artillery, with all the men he could muster, who took 
post at Police Headquarters, while General Sandford, 
with seven hundred men, occupied the State Arsenal, on 
the corner of Seventh Avenue and Thirty-fifth Street. 

For two days the mob, met by the bullets and 
bayonets of the troops, fought and gave way, or scat- 
tered and extended the region of disturbance northward 
to Harlem and westward to Sixth Avenue. There 
were many hand-to-hand conflicts, but at length, on the 
third day, the force being increased by the ordering 
home of the city regiments, discipline prevailed, and at 
midnight the telegraph reported all quiet. 

One thousand of the rioters had been killed and 
many more wounded. 

In the spring of 1865 an ovation to the veterans, who 
returned with tattered banners and honorable scars, 
closed the record of the Civil War. 



XXIII. AN OLD MAN'S RECOLLECTIONS 

OF NEW YORK. 

SOMETIMES we have the pleasure of strolHng 
along Broadway with a highly respected friend, 
an old gentleman of eighty-five, who is still alert and 
vigorous, and brimming over with recollections of old 
times, when he was young. 

** Strange," said he, one morning, *' but the most 
vivid of my boyhood impressions are of the Broadway 
stages, which were first put on about 1830. Four fine 
horses drew them, and there was a Jehu above who 
knew how to handle the ribbons. All the stages were 
painted in the brightest colors, and properly named as 
' Lady Clinton,' * Lady Washington,' ' The Knicker- 
bocker,' etc. They left the Battery hourly for Green- 
wich, Harlem, Bloomingdale, and Manhattanville, and 
no fare was collected till the end of the route. I seem 
to hear this moment the drivers calling, 'Manhattanville, 
ma'm,' ' Right away for Yorkville,' and so on. 

*' Down there at the corner of West Broadway and 
Franklin was Riley's Fifth Ward Museum Hotel, the 
Eden Musee of my youthful days. On its walls, and in 
glass cases, were original portraits of great warriors and 
statesmen, decorated with their swords and portions of 
their uniforms. There were also curiosities — a two- 

259 



26o 




Broadway Stages. 



headed calf, a pig that had killed a man by butting him 
off a bridge, one of the Hawaiian clubs that had dashed 
out the brains of Captain Cook, General Jackson's pipe, 
Tecumseh's rifle, and many relics of colonial days in 
New York. 

*' What interested us boys most, because it brought 
back the days of the Revolution, was a headless and 
armless statue of William Pitt, the very one that the 
patriots of New York raised on the steps of the Royal 
Exchange, in i 766, to celebrate the repeal of the Stamp 
Act, and w^hich British soldiers mutilated in the war, 
because the patriots had carried off the leaden statue of 
George III., which stood on the Bowling Green, and 
melted it up for bullets. Over there on the Hudson, at 



26l 

the foot of the present Houston Street, was a great 
swamp, wliere I've roosted pigeons many a time, and 
Minetta Brook, that flowed through it — never were there 
such trout as I caught there in my schoolboy days." 

When we came to Canal Street my friend looked up 
and down its wide vista longingly. 

" Here I lived as a boy," he said at last. " It was the 



mt 












III 






11 ■• ..^^^3=^ 










,1; 






1' 



Canal Street and Broadway. 



fashionable street of the city in 1820-1830. Beginning in 
1809, a canal was dug through the marshes to the North 
River, for draining the great pond, called the Collect, 
on the present site of the Tombs. A street was laid 
out on each side of this canal, with a double row of 
beautiful, shade trees, the whole forming a noble thor- 
oughfare one hundred feet wide, the present Canal 
Street. Many of the old Knickerbocker families settled 
there, the lawns of their fine mansions extending to the 
street, and their flower and vegetable gardens, pastures 



262 

and meadows, stretching back into the country. We 
boys had our canoes on the canal in summer and skated 
there in winter. It seems as though there are no such 
maidens nowadays as sailed and skated with us on that 
dear old canal." 

Here our venerable friend paused and looked through 
the maze of buildings toward the southeast. 

" Down there," said he, ''where the hide and' leather 
men now have their mart, lay another great swamp in 
my father's day. In the rear of the Harpers' great 
establishment, he told me, he had often shot duck and 
trapped mink and otter. 

" In 1825, while I was still a boy, it was all open 
country above Astor Place — forest and swamp, farms 
and farmhouses, apple orchards and gardens. On the 
present site of Grace Church stood a high, peaked 
barn, and above it, up to the powder house (now Union 
Square), were but two dw^ellings — old stone farmhouses 
w^ith long, sloping roofs and dormer windows. A little 
south of the present site of the Astor Library were the 
Vauxhall Gardens, reaching through from Broadway to 
the Bowery, and beautifully laid out with flowers, lawns, 
trees, and shrubbery, where a band played on summer 
nights, and polite New York, as well as the commonalty, 
came to see the fireworks and to partake of ice cream, 
cakes, and ale. Farther north, in the apex of the tri- 
angle made by the junction of Third and Fourth 
avenues, stood Peter Cooper's grocery store, on the site 
of the present Cooper Institute, and many a penny 
have I exchanged there for the seductive jackson ball 
or taffy. 



263 

** Bleecker Street was my great blackberry preserve 
when a boy. What luscious berries grew beside its 
walls, and wild roses — none such bloom nowadays.'' 

Another day we began at the City Hall, and went for 
a stroll down Broadway to the Battery, and around by 
the East River docks, where the few sailing ships that 
remain are moored. 

"The City Hall," he began, "was opened in 1812, 
having been nine years in building. That was one year 
before I was born. It stood between two prisons, I 
remember, the Bridewell and the jail. On the north 
side of the park, on Chambers Street, were the Academy 
of Fine Arts, founded in 1808, with Chancellor Living- 
ston as president, and the famous painter John Trum- 
bull as vice president, and the almshouse. A space 
farther east was the Rotunda of John Vanderlyn, where 
people went to see pictures as now they go to the 
National Academy or Fine Arts Building. Vanderlyn 
was a notable artist in my day, and one of the pets of 
society. His ' Marius amid the Ruins of Carthage ' 
had taken the prize at the Paris Salon, and he returned 
to New York a famous man. To encourage art the city 
built the Rotunda, and gave Vanderlyn the lease of it 
for a studio and for the exhibition of his pictures. 

" On the southeast side of the park, near the site of 
the present ' Sun ' building, stood the old Park Theater, 
the fashionable place of amusement of my day, where I 
saw Edmund Kean and Charles Mathews and other 
actors, and such assemblages of fair women and brave 
men as are rarely seen nowadays. This theater was 
burned on the morning of May 25, 1820, but John Jacob 



264 



Astor and John K. Beekman rebuilt it on the old 
site in much handsomer style. 

" Tammany Hall then stood on the east side of the 
park, at the corner of Frankfort Street. Aaron Burr, 
who returned to New York quietly in 18 12, and in a 
week held retainers to the amount of twenty thousand 




Tammany Hall. 

dollars, had an office in the hall, and was understood to 
be one of its ruling spirits. 

" The south side of the park was then for the most 
part covered with low wooden buildings, in which were 
cigar stores, fruit shops, beer saloons, and the like. 
The present giants of the press that later took posses- 
sion of so large a space of it were then unknown. I 
have seen them grow from infancy. The * Sun ' was 
founded first, in 1833, ^^^^^ the 'Herald' in 1835, the 
* Tribune 'in 1 84 1 , the * Times ' in 1 85 1 , and the ' World ' 
in i860. 



265 

** Lower Broadway," my friend continued, '' was in 
my day almost as crowded and noisy as now. I saw 
traffic blocked at the corner of Fulton and Broadway 
in boyhood, and the policemen stationed there were 
kept quite as busy then as now. 

" The street venders were almost as numerous then, 
too, but of a different character. Some sold hot corn 
on the ear; some sold baked pears swimming in mo- 
lasses; others, in long white frocks, peddled Rockaway 
sand in two-wheeled carts. Colored men hawked 
bundles of straw for filling beds, and an old blind man 
sold door mats made of picked tarred rope. There 
were men who made fortunes by supplying the people 
with * tea water ' at two cents a pail, from clear, cold 
springs in the upper part of the island. Before Croton 
water came in 1842, you know, we were dependent for 
water on wells, cisterns, and springs. 

** We had bogy men, too, that our mothers and 
nurses frightened us with, just as now they use the 
sandman. There was the ' limekiln man,' so called 
because he slept in the limekilns around Gansevoort 
Street, and went about in shabby clothes white with 
lime, forever muttering to himself. There was the 
' blue man,' with face bluish in color, and a man who 
in the coldest weather walked the streets without an 
overcoat." 

By this time we had arrived at the Battery. 

"I am rejoiced," said he, ''to see this park of my 
boyhood reclaimed and made once more a beautiful 
place. In my day it was the fashionable promenade of 
the city. The old fort, which^ I see, they have uncovered 



266 

and turned Into an aquarium, then pointed grim guns 
seaward through its embrasures. We called it F'ort 
Clinton. It was built about 1807, when our troubles 
witli England and France pointed to war ; and when 
war with England finally came in 1812, it formed one 
of the defenses of the city. Later it was turned into a 




Castle Garden 



summer resort, called Castle Garden, with concerts and 
other attractions. I heard Jenny Lind there in 1850, 
when she made her first appearance in America under 
the auspices of the great P. T. Barnum. It was on 
Wednesday, September 11, and four thousand people 
crowded into the garden to hear her sing. 

" It is historic ground, this Battery. From It the 
British took their departure in 1783, and Washington 
set out for Paulus Hook on his way to Virginia, and 
here we received Lafayette on his second visit to this 
country in 1824. Lafayette arrived on the French 
packet Cadvins from Havre, and was met down the 
harbor by the city fathers, with our handsome and 



267 

scholarly mayor, William Paulding, at their head. Next 
day the city held a holiday in his honor. At nine in 
the morning the city officials, the Chamber of Com- 
merce, and the Society of the Cincinnati proceeded to 
Staten Island, where Lafayette had spent the night as 
the guest of Vice President Daniel D. Tompkins, and 
escorted to New York the man whom the whole coun- 
try delighted to honor, because he had fought for her in 
the Revolution, and had later performed great services 
for liberty and humanity in his own country. 

'* The brilliant company landed here at a carpeted 
stairway, over which rose an arch decorated with laurel 
and the flags of all nations. I saw Lafayette, a small, 
delicate man, with fine, clear-cut features and the erect 
and martial air of the soldier, and I can hear again the 
salvos of artillery and the cheers of thousands that 
greeted him as he set foot on the stairway. After 
saluting the people in return he entered a carriage, to 
which four horses were attached, and was driven to the 
City Hall, where he was formally welcomed by Mayor 
Paulding." 

During another stroll my friend spoke of the im- 
provements and inventions he had seen come into use. 
Gas, street cars, Croton water, the elevated road, tele- 
phone, district messenger service, parks, elevators — he 
had seen them all. 

''People began talking about gas in 181 7," he said. 
** It had been used by David Murdoch to light a house 
in Redruth, Cornwall, England, as early as 1792, but 
came into use slowly. The first mains were laid in 
Broadway in 1825. Before that we used tallow dips 



268 

and whale oil lamps. I well remember how timid 
people hesitated about allowing the mysterious new 
agent to come into their houses. Up to 1852, nine 
years before the war, we had no street cars, only stages 
and omnibuses. There were twenty-four lines of these 
in 185 I. The first street car line opened was the Sixth 
Avenue, in 1852, and so great a convenience did it 
prove that they rapidly multiplied. The elevated roads 
did not begin running until 1876, the Ninth Avenue line 
being completed that year as far as Fifty-ninth Street. 
In June, 1878, the Sixth Avenue line was opened from 
Rector Street to Central Park ; in August of the same 
year the Third Avenue line was opened to Forty-second 
Street; and in 1880 the Second Avenue line to Sixty- 
seventh Street. The same year the lines on both sides 
of the city reached Harlem. 

" Croton water dates only from 1842. An agitation 
for pure water began in 1831. Up to that time we had 
used water from wells and springs, which, with the 
growth of the city, began to be rendered impure by 
sewage, and produced much sickness. Many men 
turned an honest penny by bringing water in carts from 
the upper part of the island. Robert L. Stevens, a 
famous engineer of that day, was, I believe, the first to 
suggest the Croton watershed for a supply. A large 
party was in favor of the Bronx. Many surveys were 
made, many plans broached and discussed. At last a 
board of engineers reported in favor of an aqueduct 
fifteen miles long to take Croton water near the mouth 
of that river, and deliver thirty million gallons daily at 
a distributing reservoir on Murray Hill, 



269 

" The legislature ordered a vote of the people to 
decide whether this should be done, and as this was 
overwhelmingly in favor, the engineers at once began 
the stupendous work. Croton Lake was first staked 
out, and the course of the aqueduct from the dam to 
the Harlem laid out. At this point Major David B. 
Douglas, the engineer in charge, had a difficulty with 
the chairman of the board of commissioners, and was 
retired, John B. Jervis, an engineer and inventor of 
merit, who had assisted in building the Erie Canal, being 
appointed in his place ; but Major Douglas's plans were 
retained. For several years the great work went on 
section after section being completed, the legislature 
authorizing the money to pay for each as it was finished. 
A dam was thrown across the Croton, deep ravines 
were crossed, lofty hills tunneled, an aqueduct bridge 
across the deep valley of Sing Sing built, and another, 
the present High Bridge, over the Harlem. On June 
22, 1842, the work was practically complete from the 
Croton to the distributing reservoir at Fifth Avenue and 
Forty-second Street, except that. High Bridge not being 
finished, the water was carried for the time being by 
siphon pipes under the Harlem River. 

*' On June 22 water was for the first time let into the 
canal, and a small boat, called the Croton Maid, carry- 
ing four persons, was sent through it. On June 27 
water was admitted to the receiving reservoir at York- 
ville in the presence of the governor of the State, the 
mayor, common council, and many other dignitaries of 
the city, and on July 4, with similar ceremonies, to the 
distributing reservoir. 



270 

" On the succeeding 14th of October the people cele- 
brated the event. New York had nev^er seen such a 
splendid pageant, which far surpassed, it is said, that at 
the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825. The governor 
and other State officers, members of Congress, foreign 
consuls, mayors of other cities, were present, and took 
part in the great parade, which stretched from one end 
of the city to the other. At the City Hall President 




City Hall Park. 



Stevens made a formal transfer of the aqueduct to the 
city, artillery thundered in honor of the event, and the 
new fountain in City Hall Park sent its pearly column 
sixty feet into the air. 

" You can scarcely believe that until 1857, four years 
before the Civil War, we had no parks worthy of the 
name, the Battery and City Hall Park being really the 
city's only breathing places. In 1853, as a result of 
two years' agitation, the legislature authorized the city 
to take the land between Fifty-ninth and One Hundred 
and Sixth streets and Fifth and Eighth avenues for a 



271 

public park ; later the northern line was extended to 
One Hundred and Tenth Street. The tract was then a 
wilderness of crag, swamp, pestilential pool, and rocky 
ravine, covered with unsightly hovels, stables, and other 
nuisances. On April 17, 1857, an act passed the legis- 
lature which named the proposed new park Central 
Park, and created a board of eleven commissioners for 
laying it out. This board advertised for plans, and 
from the thirty-three submitted chose that of two 
young landscape architects, Frederick Law Olmsted 
and Calvert Vaux, as the best. Their plan provided 
for a broad driveway so constructed as to make as long 
and beautiful a road as possible, winding in and out 
amid lakes, forests, glens, cascades, meadows, and pas- 
tures. A small army of workmen was engaged, and, 
under the leadership of the two gentlemen above 
named, converted the unsightly waste into the beauti- 
ful earthly paradise we now know. 

'' Riverside Park was acquired 1 869-1 872, and Morn- 
ingside Park soon after. But the city was now fully alive 
to the beauty and necessity of these breathing places, and 
in 1883, soon after the annexation of the Westchester 
County towns, the legislature appointed a commission 
to secure lands for public parks above the Harlem. This 
commission reported in 1884, and the legislature then 
provided for the laying out of Van Cortlandt, Bronx, 
Pelham Bay, Crotona, Claremont, and St. Marys parks, 
which, with their connecting parkways, stretch from 
the Hudson to the Sound, ^ and give New York a system 
of public parks equaled by no other city in the world." 

1 For a fuller description of these parks see Chapter XXVII. 



XXIV. A HUNDRED YEARS OF PROGRESS. 

WHEN the British left New York in 1783, a Hne 
drawn from Catherine Street, on the East River, 
across the island to the foot of Reade Street, on the Hud- 
son, would have inclosed the city. The streets were 




Oldtime Mansion, Washington Square. 

irregular, the houses of red brick, mostly with tiled 
and pointed roofs. Wall Street was wide and elegant. 
Broadway was the fashionable quarter. In 1795 sewers 
were first introduced. In 1800 the town boasted sixty 
thousand inhabitants. By 1825 the city had reached 

272 



Bleecker Street. In 1843-1844, after the Introduction 
of Croton water, a new era of progress began. Fash- 
ionable New York escaped from its modest dwelHngs 
downtown, and began to build houses of far greater 
pretension uptown. Some of these mansions you may 
still see in Washington Square, Waverley Place, Bond 
Street, and lower Fifth Avenue, which then became 
the fashionable quarter. Shrewd observers now noted 
in the people a much nearer approach to the European 




" Brownstone began to be used." 

style of living. '' The number of servants in livery in- 
creases," wrote Lydia Maria Child, the poetess, about 
this time. *' Foreign artistic upholsterers are being im- 
ported. There will soon be more houses furnished 
according to the taste and fashion of noblemen in New 
York than in Paris. Furniture for a single room often 
costs ten thousand dollars." 

By 1850 the city had reached Thirty-fourth Street 
on the north, and covered the ground from river to 

TODD, N. Y.— 18 



274 



river. Yorkville, Bloomingdale, and Manhattanville were 
still lovely pastoral villages in the open country. By 

1856 the popula- 
tion had reached 
six hundred and 
thirty thousand. 
Brownstone in- 
stead of red brick 
began to be used 
for building about 
this time. People 
lived in their own 
houses, and not 
in apartments or 
hotels. Tene- 

ments were few, 
and French flats 
wholly unknown. 
The streets were 
badly paved and 
lighted, and, be- 
ing rarely cleaned, emitted the odors of the streets of 
Cologne. New York was metropolitan only in its com- 
merce. This state of affairs continued until 1865. 

During the war New York made little progress, but 
with the return of peace she awoke from her slumbers, 
and entered upon an era of enterprise that in a genera- 
tion transformed her into a metropolis. In 1865 the 
country above Forty-second Street was a wilderness of 
forest and crag, of ungraded and unpaved streets, with 
the squatter's cabin perched on every available emi- 




A Scene on Broadway, 1893. 



^75 

nence. Rapid transit being then unknown, and street 
cars few, people could not reach the upper part of the 
island, and New York expanded in the direction of 
Brooklyn, New Jersey, and Staten Island. In 1865 
there was scarcely a six-story building in the city. The 
Astor House was one of the most notable structures, 




The Brooklyn Bridge. 

and was the most elegant hotel in New York. Most of 
the houses were two and three stories high, but the 
invention of the elevator made the present towering 
structures possible. 

The demand for cheaper homes and rents led also to 
the building of the East River Bridge, a company to 
build it being incorporated by the legislature in 1867, 



2^6 



with John A. RoebHng a^ chief engineer. In January, 
1870, work was begun on the foundations for the towers. 

John A. Roebhng, 
the great engi- 
neer, died before 
his grand concep- 
tion was realized, 
and his equally 
gifted son, Wash- 
ington A. Roeb- 
ling, took up the 
work and carried 
it to completion. 
The bridge was 
completed and 
dedicated with 
appropriate cere- 
monies on May 
24, 1883, thirteen 
years after the 
work began . 
Meantime New York w^as pushing her way northward 
toward the Harlem. The first ten years after the war 
were marked by reckless speculation, especially in real 
estate, a mania greatly stimulated by the Tweed Ring,^ 
which came into powder during this period. 

1 This ring was formed by William M. Tweed, a politician of the city, 
who, after filling various minor offices, became chairman of the board of 
supervisors and deputy street commissioner, an office which put him in 
control of the city's public works. The ring's methods were simple but ■ 
shrewd : for everything done for or furnished to the city a sum ranging from 
sixty to eighty-five per cent more than the real cost was charged in the 




Wall Street. 



277 

In 1870 New York had 64,044 houses and 942,292 
inhabitants. The desire for expansion and the certainty 
of rapid transit by the elevated railroads led to the 
annexation in 1873 of the three towns of Morrisania, 
West Farms, and Kingsboro, in Westchester County, 
above the Harlem, which movement carried the city's 
northerly boundary line to Yonkers, and added thirteen 
thousand acres to her area. By act of the legislature 
of 1895 Westchester, Eastchester, Pelham, and Wake- 
field (South Mount Vernon) w^ere annexed, adding 
twenty thousand acres more, and carrying her boundary 
line eastward to the city of Mount Vernon. 

bills, the excess being divided among the members of the ring. Tweed 
added to the prevailing mania by projecting public improvements of every 
sort on a large scale. Detection and punishment came to the conspira- 
tors at last. In 1S71 copies of the fraudulent bills came into possession 
of the New York " Times," which gave them to the public in double- 
leaded columns. Other members of the press ably seconded the " Times," 
and a committee of seventy was formed to bring the rogues to justice. 
Most of the latter fled to F^urope. Tweed remained, was arrested, tried, 
and sentenced to the penitentiary on Blackwells Island, from which, in 
1875, his friends procured his release on bail; but he was at once re- 
arrested on a civil suit to recover six million dollars alleged to have been 
stolen from the city treasury. Not being able to find the bail required, — 
three million dollars, — he was lodged in Ludlow Street Jail, whence he 
shortly after escaped and fled to Spain. The Spanish authorities de- 
livered him up at our request, however ; he was brought back, tried on the 
civil suit, and a verdict of $6,537,000 returned against him by the jury. 
Being unable to pay this, he was thrown into jail, and there died in 
January, 1878. 



XXV. GREATER NEW YORK. 

IT would be difficult to decide who first publicly 
advocated a union of New York with Brooklyn and 
neighboring- towns on Long Island and above the 
Harlem. Ex-Comptroller Andrew H. Green, because 
of his earnest and persistent advocacy of it, has been 
called the father of the movement. Practically the 
interests of these towns and of New York were the 
same, and it was believed that with a wider territory 
government would be less costly, and the formation of 
rings and cliques to control patronage would be more 
difficult. The question first took tangible shape when 
the legislature of New York, in 1890, created a commis- 
sion *' to inquire into the expediency of the proposed 
consolidation, and to submit a report with recommen- 
dations." Andrew H. Green of New York was presi- 
dent of this commission, and J. S. T. Stranahan of 
Brooklyn vice president ; there were also nine other 
members, chosen impartially from the cities and towns 
interested. 

This commission presented a bill to the legislature of 
1893, submitting the question to a plebiscite, or vote of 
the people of the districts interested. The bill was not 
acted on at that time, however, but the next legislature 

— th^t of 1894 — passed it, and the people, when the 

278 



279 

question came before them, voted In favor of it, that is, 
all except the city of Mount Vernon, the town of West- 
chester, and the township of Flushing. To the legis- 
lature of 1895 ^he commission presented a report, and 
with it a bill declaring the districts affected — with the 




Wharves, East Shore of Manhattan. 

exception of Mount Vernon — a part of the city of New 
York. But the bill failed to pass, because of the adop- 
tion of an amendment, at the closing hours of the ses- 
sion, referring the whole matter back to the people. As 
a result of the movement, however, the legislature at this 
session annexed the towns of Westchester, Eastchester, 
Pelham, and some other parts of Westchester County 
to New York. But the matter was not allowed to rest. 



28o 



The legislature of 1896 appointed a joint committee of 
four senators and five assemblymen to inquire into the 

matter and report 
not later than March 
1 1, 1896. This com- 
mittee, through its 
chairman, Senator 
Lexow, reported in 
favor of consolida- 
tion, and also a bill 
to effect it, which bill 
passed theSenateby 
avote of thirty-eight 
to eight, and the As- 
sembly by a vote of 
ninety-one to fifty- 
six, and this despite 
strenuous opposi- 
tion by prominent 
citizens of New 




Hotel Waldorf-Astoria, New York. 



York and Brooklyn. It was then submitted, accord- 
ing to law, to the mayors of New York, Brooklyn, 
and Long Island City (the cities interested), was 
vetoed by Mayor Strong of New York and by Mayor 
Wurster of Brooklyn, and approved by Mayor Gleason 
of Long Island City. The measure then went back 
to the Assembly, and was a second time passed over the 
vetoes of the two mayors, and was signed by Governor 
Morton on May 11, 1896, thus becoming a law. Sec- 
tion I of this act defined the bounds of the territory 
to be added to New York, viz., the county of Kings 



28l 

(Brooklyn), the county of Richmond (Staten Island), 
the city of Long Island City, the towns of Newtown, 
Flushing, Jamaica, and that part of the town of Hemp- 
stead which is westerly of a straight line drawn from 
the southeasterly point of the town of Flushing, through 
the middle of the channel between Rockaway Beach and 
Shelter Island, to the Atlantic Ocean. 

Section 3 provided for a commission of fifteen 
persons, — the president of the commission of 1890, the 
mayors of New York, Brooklyn, and Long Island City, 
the State engineer, surveyor, and attorney-general, and 
nine other persons, — to be appointed by the governor, to 
draft a charter or form of government for the enlarged 
city. This commission, of which Benjamin F. Tracy was 
president and George M. Pinney, Jr., secretary, sub- 
mitted a charter for the greater city to the legislature 
of 1897, which, after amendments by that body, was 
adopted and approved by Governor Black May 2, 1897. 

As qitizens of New York we are interested in this 
charter, which prescribes the government under which 
we shall live, no doubt, for many years. By examining 
it closely we shall see that it differs considerably from 
former charters. One great point of difference is that it 
adopts the borough system of government, after the 
English fashion. There are fiv^f these boroughs, viz., 
the borough of Manhattan, which includes the old city of 
New York, on Manhattan Island and the adjacent 
islands; the borough of the Bronx, which includes the 
annexed district above the Harlem and Spuyten Duyvil 
Creek, and the islands adjacent ; the borough of Brook- 
lyn, comprising the whole of Kings County ; the 



282 

borough of Queens, including that part of Queens 
County named in the act of annexation; and the 
borough of Richmond, which comprises all of Staten 
Island. 

The government is vested in a mayor and a municipal 
assembly of two chambers — a council composed of 
twenty-nine members, who are elected for four years, 
and a board of aldermen of sixty members, who are 
elected for two years. The president of the council is 
elected by the entire city, but the other twenty-eight 
members are chosen by districts. There are five of 
these districts in the boroughs of Manhattan and the 
Bronx, each of which chooses three councilmen, and 
three in the borough of Brooklyn, which choose the 
same number, while the boroughs of Queens and of 
Richmond are each represented by two members. 

The aldermen are chosen by assembly districts, each 
of the sixty assembly districts of the city sending one 
member. Ex-mayors of the new city will have a seat 
in the council, but no vote, and the heads of depart- 
ments seats in the board of aldermen, with the same 
restriction. 

The municipal assembly wields large powers, subject 
to certain checks and restrictions. It has power to 
establish ferries and to Duild tunnels under and bridges 
over all waters within the city limits, to build docks 
and improve the water front, to open and extend streets, 
construct parks, schoolhouses, and public buildings, and 
supply water and the means of rapid transit from one 
quarter of the city to another; but its acts are subject 
to the approval of the mayor, and to pass a grant of 



283 

any public franchise over his veto it must have a five- 
sixths vote. In granting franchises the approval of the 
board of estimate and apportionment is also required. 
The grant, if of a street or highway, can be for only 
twenty-five years. The Assembly cannot authorize 
loans or issue bonds without the prior approval of the 
above-named board, and if such bond issue is for repav- 
ing streets it must be unanimous. It may also establish 
additional waterworks and acquire property for the pur- 
pose. It must consider the yearly tax budget when 
prepared by the board of estimate and apportionment, 
and may reduce it, but cannot increase it. It has 
power to pass all necessary laws and ordinances, and 
must see that these are faithfully observed. Contracts 
for city work or supplies of more than one thousand 
dollars' value must be authorized by this assembly un- 
less it otherwise orders by a three-fourths vote. 

The business of the city is carried on by the mayor 
and his heads of departments. The mayor is elected 
for a term of four years by the whole city, and appoints 
all heads of departments, except the comptroller, who 
is elected by the people. There are fourteen depart- 
ments, — finance, law, police, public improvements, 
bridges, parks, buildings, public charities, correction, 
fire, docks and ferries, taxes and assessments, education, 
and health, — besides six included in the department 
of public works, viz., water supply, highways, street 
cleaning, sewers, public buildings, lighting and supplies. 

The department of public works is a very important 
one. It is composed of the heads of the six depart- 
ments above enumerated, together with a president of 



284 

the board (who is appointed by the mayor). The mayor, 
comptroller, corporation counsel, and the presidents of 
the five boroughs are members of it by virtue of their 
office, but the presidents can vote only upon questions 
affecting their respective boroughs. This board has 
charge of all the streets, bridges, and the sewer and 
water systems of the city. It must take the first step 
in all proposed public improvements, but if the work be 
of great extent it must also have the approval of the 
board of estimate and apportionment. All work ordered 
by it must have the approval of the municipal assem- 
bly. This board, in addition to its other powers, may 
lay out new streets and parks, build new bridges and 
tunnels and their approaches, change the grades of 
streets, and so forth. 

Another very important board is that of estimate and 
apportionment, which is composed of the mayor, comp- 
troller, corporation counsel, president of the council, 
and president of the board of taxes and assessments. 
Its principal duty is, before January i of each year, 
to make a " budget," or estimate of the amount of 
money required to conduct the business of the city 
during the ensuing year. It must also provide money 
to meet the city's obligations, or bonds, as they become 
due, and pay the interest on the same ; also audit 
charges against the city for counsel's fees incurred by 
city officials in defending themselves against unjust 
charges ; fix, with the municipal assembly, the salaries of 
certain employees, transfer excess of appropriations from 
one department to another, and perform various other 
minor duties. 



285 

The borOLiofh boards form the most novel feature of 
the new charter. These boards consist of a president, 
who is elected by the people of the borough for a term 
of four years, and the members of the municipal assem- 
bly residing within the borough limits. Each borough 
is divided into districts of local improvement, which 
are the same as the Senate districts of the counties ; then 
each of these districts has its local board, composed of 
the members of the municipal assembly residing in that 
district. These local boards have power to begin pro- 
ceedings in all cases of street or sewer improvement 
within their district, where the work is to be paid for in 
whole or in part by assessments on the property of that 
district. They can also recommend the laying of side- 
walks and the providing of street lamps and signs. They 
also hear complaints of nuisances in streets, or of dis- 
orderly houses, liquor saloons, gambling houses, and the 
like, and may inquire as to the condition of the poor in 
their district. When a petition for a local improvement 
is presented to the president of a borough board, he 
must call a meeting of the local board within fifteen 
days, and if that board recommends that the work be 
done, a resolution to that effect must be adopted, and a 
copy sent to the department of public improvements. 

On January i, 1898, the new city came into existence, 
with Robert A. Van Wyck, who had been elected as the 
candidate of the Democratic party the November previ- 
ous, as its first mayor. 

Before closing it will be interesting to present some 
statistics of Greater New York in comparison with Lon- 
don, Paris, and Berlin. 



286 

In population she is the second city in the world, 
London having 4,463,169 souls,^ Paris 2,51 1,629, Berliri 
1,726,098, New York 3>389,753- 

In area she is the first city in the world, London 
having 74,672 acres, Paris 19,279, BerHn 15,662, and 
New York 193,850. 

In public parks also she leads the cities of the earth. 
New York having 6,587.52 acres, London 5,976, Paris 
4,739, and Berlin 1,637. 

She has 1,002.34 miles of paved streets, London 
1,818, Paris 604, and Berlin 500. 

She has 1,156.21 miles of sewers to London's, 2,500, 
Paris's 599, Berlin's 465. 

She has 531.84 miles of street railroad, London none, 
Paris 24, Berlin 225. 

The assessed value of her real estate is $2,377,277,- 
820; London's, $5,335,140,654. 

Her net bonded debt is $185,081,850, that of Lon- 
don $200,000,000, of Paris $520,677,830, of Berlin 
$69,937,098. 

Her annual expenses are $60,000,000, London's 
$65,000,000, Paris's $72,701,700, Berlin's $21,294,333. 

Her daily water supply is 330,000,000 gallons, that of 
London 203,000,000, of Paris 136,000,000, of Berlin 
30,000,000. 

1 Including the whole metropolitan district London has 6,291,677. 



XXVI. BROOKLYN. 

FREQUENT references have been made to Brook- 
lyn in the preceding narrative, the settlement and 
growth of which went on side by side with that of 
New York. One of the first acts of the West India 
Company was to buy of the Indians the whole western 
end of Long Island. As early as 1645 we know there 
were farms along the road from Flatbush to the ferry. 




Brooklyn City Hall. 
287 



288 



By 1646 nearly the whole water front had been cleared 
and put under cultivation, and there were small villages 
at the Wallabout, the ferry, and Gowanus. 

The same year Kieft ordered an election for two 
schepens, or aldermen, for " Breuckelen," and a little 
later a schout, or constable. The Heights early became 
a favorite site for the residences of the gentry, Philip 
Livingston possessing a fine mansion on the east side of 
Hicks Street, near Joralemon, prior to 1764. 

Brooklyn was incorporated as a village in 18 16 (April 

1 2), in which year 
the first public 
schoolhouse was 
built. It was not 
until 1834 that it 
was incorporated 
as a citv, and then 
against the stren- 
uous opposition 
of the assembly- 
men from New 
York, who urged 
that the interests 
of the two towns 
were the same, 
and that Brook- 
lyn ought to be 
one with New 
York. At this 
time (1834) the country road, the "King's Highway" 
of colonial times, ran crookedly up the hill from the 




Memorial Arch, Brooklyn. 



289 

'■' ferry slip " (now Fulton Ferry), past an old Dutch 
church set in the middle of the road, and on through 
Bedford and Jamaica to Montauk Point. The town was 
then well built up as far as the junction of the present 
Main and Fulton streets. 

Meantime to the north another city was growing. 
Bushwick, later Williamsburgh, and later still the East- 
ern District of Brooklyn, was settled in 164 1 -1650 by a 
few Norman immigrants, who in March, 1660, erected a 
village, defended by a blockhouse, on a point of land 
near the foot of the present South Fifth Street, the block- 
house being intended for defense against Indians. A 
month before, fourteen French immigrants, with a Dutch- 
man to teach them the arts of pioneer life, had settled 
near the present site of Maspeth. Bushwick was patented 
in 1687, with a population of seven hundred and fifty- 
nine souls ; Williamsburgh was incorporated in April, 
1827; and that city and Bushwick were annexed to 
Brooklyn in April, 1854, as the Eastern District. 



TODD, N. Y.— 19 



XXVII. THE BRONX. 

IN two respects New York is now the greatest city 
in the world — in area, and in the variety, beauty, 
and magnitude of her pubhc parks. While Central Park 
and Prospect Park are the pride of the city, it is not 
until one passes over the Harlem and wanders through 
the miles of forests and meadows of Van Cortlandt 
Park, or in Bronx Park follows the clear and silvery 
waters of the Bronx to the wide green levels of Pelham 
Bay Park, with its cool breezes and wide views of the 
Sound, that one appreciates the greatness of our park 
system, and the farsightedness of those city officials 
who, about 1870, began the movement that resulted in 
the acquiring of these forest-clad districts, to be held 
forever for the delight and well being of the people of 
the city. 

Van Cortlandt Park, which lies nearest the Hudson 
and extends from the Yonkers line almost to Spuyten 
Duyvil, is two miles long by one mile wide, and contains 
1,132 acres. Pelham Bay Park exceeds it, however, 
having 1,756 acres, while Bronx Park falls in behind 
with 662 acres. When you consider that Central Park 
contains but 840 acres, and Prospect 516^, you get 
a better idea of the magnitude of these later parks. 

Van Cortlandt Park comprises part of the famous old 

290 



291 




The Bronx. 



manor of PhilHpseborough. The city has done little 
more to improve it than to lay out good roads through 
its forests and valleys. 

If, on leaving Kingsbridge, we follow the bicyclers 
along the old Albany Post Road north, we shall see, 
shortly before reaching the Yonkers city line, the old 
Van Cortlandt manor house, a fine old mansion stand- 
ing in the fields on our left, with wide lawns in front. 
It occupies the site of a blockhouse erected by Gov- 
ernor Dongan as an outpost and place of refuge from 
the Indians for hunting and scouting parties. Jacobus 
Van Cortlandt married Eva Phillipse, daughter of Fred- 
erick, the famous lord of PhilHpseborough, and his son 
Frederick built the present mansioii in 1 748, as you 
may see by a stone on the southeast corner. It is now 



292 

the property of the city, being included in the park, 
and we may enter freely. Here are the wide halls, the 
huge fireplaces, flanked by blue tiles bearing pictures 




Van Cortlandt Manor House. 



of scriptural scenes, the deep window seats where the 
young people found quiet retreats and their elders 
smoked and gravely talked in colonial days. 

In the Revolution, when this section was a dark and 
bloody ground, and the outposts of the British and 
patriot armies confronted each other from these hill- 
tops, the old house was the headquarters of the com- 
mander of the German yagers. A few days before 
the British left New York forever, on Evacuation Day, 
1783, General Washington and his staff took up their 



293 

abode here, the general making it his headquarters 
until he, with his army, occupied the city. The bed in 
which he slept is still preserved in the old house. 

Because of its historical interest, the Colonial Dames of 
the State of New York secured a lease of it for twenty- 
five years, and opened there a very interesting collec- 
tion of relics of the Revolution and of colonial times. 

On a part of the estate is still shown an old oak on 
which thirty ''cowboys" were hanged during the Revo- 
lution. At that time this region quite over to the Bronx, 
and to the Sound for that matter, lay " between the 
lines," and was ranged over and harried by Tories and 
patriots alternately, the one side being termed " cow- 
boys," and the other ''skinners." First the Tories 
would make a raid, and then the patriots would attack 
them in reprisal, while both parties plundered the peace- 
ful Quakers without mercy. ^ By 1779 these people had 
become mere marauding bands, plundering both Whig 
and Tory impartially, and in January of that year 
Colonel Aaron Burr was ordered to take command of 
the " lines," punish the marauders, and give peace to 
the country. He was admirably fitted for the task, 
and did what others had not been able to do. First 
he drew a map of the country, showing all the roads 
and paths by which the culprits could escape. Then 
he made a list of all the inhabitants, putting each in his 
proper class, as whig, tory, half tory, spy, marauder, 
etc., and when an outrage was committed made every 

1 In Cooper's fine novel of "The Spy "you will find spirited accounts 
of the conflicts between cowboys and skinners, with graphic descriptions 
of the country. 



294 

suspected party give an account of himself. Then, with 
his men, he scouted so unceasingly, watched so vigi- 
lantly, and punished so sternly that the bands were soon 
broken up, and life and property became as secure as in 
New York or in the Continental camp. 

There are several smooth, hard roads leading eastward 
into the beautiful valley of the Bronx. From its en- 
trance into the Sound at Hunts Point, back through 
Westchester, Bronx Park, Woodlawn, Mount Vernon, 
Bronxville, Tuckahoe, and White Plains (where the 
battle was fought), to its source in the hills this side of 
the Croton divide, it presents every variety of sylvan 
and pastoral scenery, in such striking contrast with the 
works and homes of men as to be a source of constant 
surprise and delight. 



INDEX. 



Adams, John, arrives in New York, 
195 ; receives Washington, 197. 

Allerton, Isaac, 58. 

American Fur Company, 233. 

Andros, Sir Edmund, 75; appointed 
governor, 78; received, 81. 

Anne Queen, accession of, 103. 

Antill, John, 143. 

Apthorpe house, 179, 180. 

Archmigel, 90. 

Arnold, Isaac, 95. 

Assembly, first Provincial, 79. 

Astor, John Jacob, 230. 

Auchmuty, Rev. Dr. Samuel, 143. 

Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, 229. 

Baptists, 42. 

Barlow, Joel, 216. 

Barrett, Walter, quoted, 238. 

Bath Beach, 153. 

Battery, the, in 1830, 265. 

Battle Hill in Greenwood, 168. 

Bayard, Judith, 51. 

Bayard, Nicholas, 47, 83, 87, 113; im- 
prisoned, 90; released, 94. 

Bayard, Samuel, 143. 

Bayard, Colonel William, 143. 

Bear hunt, a, no. 

Beaver, the, 91. 

Bedford, 156, 157. 

Bell, farmers', 67. 

Bellomont, Earl of, 76, 113; appointed 
governor, loi. 

Betsy, pioneer trading ship, 236. 

Binckes, Admiral, 77. 

Black Ball line, 241. 

Block, Adriaen, discovers Long 
Island Sound, 11. 

Bogardus, Domine, death of, 38. 

Borough of the Bronx, 290. 

Boston Post Road, described, 176. 

Bowling Green, 62, 67. 

Box, Fort, 155. 

Bradford, Governor, claims Dutch 
soil, 19. 

Bradford, William, printer, 104. 



Bridge Street and bridge, 60. 

Broad Street, 60; in 1700, 121. 

Broadway, laid out, 73 ; in 1700, 112. 

Bronx Park, 290. 

Brooklyn, history of, 287. 

Brooklyn church, 156. 

Brooklyn Heights, 153. 

Buchanan, Thomas, 144. 

Burnet. William, 76. 

Burr, Major Aaron, aide to Putnam, 
159 ; rescues part of Putnam's army, 
181; duel with Hamilton, 204-207; 
subdues cowboys and skiimers, 293. 

Canal Street in 1820, 261. 

Capitol, first, 197. 

Carleton, General, 160. 

Carpesey, Gabriel, town herdsman, 
66. 

Castle Garden, 266. 

Central Park, 271. 

Chambers, Captain, 148-150. 

Charles, King, death of, 80. 

Charter, Great, 81, 82. 

Charter of Liberties and Privileges, 
80. 

Charter of New Amsterdam, 38; city 
proclaimed, 39. 

China trade, 232. 

Churchgoing in New Amsterdam, 68. 

Church service, 70, 71. 

City Hall, new, 121; used as an arse- 
nal, 151 ; built, 263. 

City Hall Park, 66 ; in 1830, 263. 

City wall (second), 117. 

Civil War, outbreak of, 250-254. 

Clennorit, 215. 

Clinton, De Witt, 221, 226. 

Clinton, George, 76, 193. 

Clipper ships, 242. 

Coast Road, 157. 

Coffeehouses, 131. 

Colden, Lieutenant Governor, 139, 143. 

Collect, the, 118. 

Columbia College, founded, 107. 

Colyer, Vincent, 255. 



295 



296 



Committee of Correspondence, ap- 
pointed, 139. 

Common, public meetings on, 146. 

Coney Island, 153. 

Congress, first sits in New York, 195 ; 
removes to Philadelphia, 202. 

Continental uniforms, 157. 

Cooper, Rev. Dr. Myles, 143. 

Cooper's, Peter, store, 262. 

Cornbury, Lord, 76. 

Cortelyou, Jacques, 112. 

Cortelyou house, 170. 

Cosby, Alexander, 123. 

Cosby, William, governor, 76, 120; or- 
ders trial of Zenger, 105. 

Craft, colonial, 56, 57. 

Cregier, Marten, 63. 

Croton water, introduced, 268. 

Cruger, John H., 143. 

Cunard, Samuel, founds Cunard line, 
249. 

Cuyler, Lieutenant, 85. 

Damen, Jan Jansen, 74. 

De Hart, Simon, 112. 

De Lancey, Chief Justice, James, fries 

Zenger, 105, 113. 
Delaware, Lackawanna and Western 

Railroad, 229. 
Dellius, Domine, land grant to, 102. 
De Peyster, Captain, 85. 
De Riemer, Isaac, 113, 122. 
Dircksen, Cornells, 72. 
Dix, Dorothea L., 255. 
Dix, John A., 254. 
Docks, city, 55, 124. 
Dolphin, the, 7. 
Dongan, Thomas, 75, 85; appointed 

governor, 79. 
Dress in 1700, 112. 
Duane, James, 193. 
Dudley, Chief Justice, presides at trial 

of Leisler, 95. 
Duke's Farm, 74. 
Duke's Laws, 76. 
Dunmore, Earl of, 76. 
DunscomlD, 165. 
Dutch, capture New York, 77. 
Dutch, description of, 9, 10. 
Dutch bed, 67. 
Dutch church, 112. 
Dutch dress, 69. 
Dutch manners and customs, 52-57. 

East India Company, Dutch, the, 10. 
East New York. 156. 
East River Bridge, 275. 
Eastern Boulevard, the, 153. 
Eelkens, Jacob, arrives in trading ship 

Willi atti, 24; ordered away, 25; 

removed by the Dutch, 27. | 



\ English, capture Manhattan, 49; dis- 
i cover New York Bay, 10 ; claim 
' Manhattan, 19. 

Erie Canal, account of, 220 ; celebra- 
tion at opening of, 222, 223. 

Erie Railroad, opened, 228. 

Evergreen Cemetery, 165. 

Evertsen, Admiral, 77. 

Ferry ordinances, 72. 

P'erryboats, 134. 

Fire company, 118. 

Fire department, 133. 

Fire engines, 133. 

Fish, 67. 

Fish, Nicholas, 159. 

Fitz Roy, Lord Augustus, 122, 

Flatbush, 156. 

Flatlands, 153. 

Fletcher, Benjamin, 76; appointed 
governor, 99; founds Trinity 
Church, 100; scandal against, 100; 
recalled, loi ; demands a trial, 102. 

Fort, the, 62. 

Fortifications of New York, 174. 

Fraunces's Tavern, 149. 

Fredericke, Kryn, 18. 

Freedom of the city, conferred, 123. 

Freeman, Thomas, 123. 

Fulton, Robert, sketch of, 215. 

Fulton Ferry, 52, 71. 

Fur trade, Canada, 231. 

Gage, Thomas, General, 143. 
Game, 66. 

Gas, introduced into New York, 267. 
"Gazette," first newspaper in New 

York, 103. 
George, Fort, 119; garrison of, 119. 
George III., statue of, 260. 
Gilliland, 165. 

Governors of New York colony, 75. 
Gowanus Canal, 153, and Creek, 155. 
Graft officer, 60. 
Grange, the, 208. 
Gravesend-, 156. 
Gravesend Bay, 153, 162. 
Greene, Fort, 156. 
Greene, General, 158. 
Greenwood Cemetery, 153, 156. 
Griffiths, John, 143. 
Griswold, N. L. & G., 237. 

Hale, Nathan, executed, 187. 

Half Moon, enters New York Bay, 9. 

Halfway House, Willinm Howard's, 

165. 
Hamilton, Alexander, 159, 204 ; death 

of, 209 ; sketch of, 210, 211. 
Hamilton, Andrew, defends Zenger, 

106. 



297 



Hamilton, Fort, 153, 162. 

Hardy, Sir Charles, ^6 ; lays corner 

stone of Columbia College, 108. 
Harlem Heights, 174, 175 ; described, 

181 ; battle of, 182-184. 
Heath, General, 158. 
Heights of Guana, 156, 157. 
Hendrik, Fort William, 78. 
" Herald," founded, 264. 
Hessians, arrive, 160. 
Hicks, Jasper, 95. 
Hoogland, 165. 
Horsmanden, Daniel, 143. 
Howe, Sir William, invests New York, 

152 ; offers amnesty, 160. 
Howland & Aspinwall, 236. 
Hudson, Henry, discovers New York 

Bay, 10. 
Hudson Bay Fur Company, 231. 
Hunter, Robert, 76. 

Indians, sell Manhattan Island, 15 ; 
trade with Dutch, 18 ; attack Dutch, 
30; submit, 32 ; attack Manhattan, 
41 ; hunting party of, 66. 

Ingoldsby, Richard, lieutenant gov- 
ernor, 90; arrives, 91, 92; demands 
surrender of fort, 93, 94 ; tries Leisler, 

95- 
Irving, Washington, 235. 

Jamaica, 156, 157. 

Jamaica Pass, unguarded, 164. 

James, Fort, 'jj. 

James, King, 80. 

Jans, Annetje, farm, 74 ; given to 

Trinity Church, 103. 
Johnson, Samuel, president Columbia 

College, 107. 
Johnson, Thomas, 95. 
"Journal, Holt's," quoted, 147. 
Jumel mansion, 182. 

Kidd, Captain, account of, 126. 

Kieft, Wilhelm, chosen director, 28 ; 
arrival, 29 ; becomes dictator, 30 ; 
at war with Indians, 31, 32; calls a 
council, 31 ; recalled, 34 ; prosecutes 
his accusers, 37 ; death, 38. 

King's Farm, 74; given to Trinity 
Church, 103. 

King's Highway, 156. 

Kip, Abraham, 117. 

Knowlton, Colonel Thomas, 182. 

Knox, General, 158. 

Kuyter, Joachim Pietersen, 37, 38. 

Labadists, the, quoted, in. 
Lafayette, arrival in New York, 266. 
Lamb, John, 144, 151 
Lehigh Valley Railroad, 229. 



Leisler, Jacob, 84; seizes government, 
86; trial of, 95; death of, 97; estate 
restored, 98, loi. 

Leitch, Major, 183. 

L'Enfant, Pierre, remodels capitol, 
197. 

Le Roux, Charles, 123. 

Liberty pole, erected, 145 ; causes a 
riot, 146. 

Lmd, Jenny, 266. 

Livingston, Phillip and Robert, 162. 

Livingston, Robert, 127, 217. 

Lockyer, Captain, 147. 

London, tea ship, 148. 

Long Island, battle of, 159-170 ; 
British troops in, 159 ; British com- 
manders in, 159; American position, 
163; British position, 162, 163; British 
advance, 164; British attack Ameri- 
can rear, 166; retreat from, 172. 

Long Island City, 280. 

Loockermans, Govert, 58. 

Lovelace, Francis, 76 ; governor, 77. 

Lutherans, 42. 

Mackinaw Fur Company, 231. 

Magaw, Colonel Robert, 184. 

Maiden Lane, 53. 

Manhattan Island, described, 14 ; pur- 
chased, 15 ; first settled, 13. 

Manning, Captain, 77. 

Markets of New York, 129. 

Martense Lane, 157. 

Massacre, Boston, 147. 

McComb mansion, 202. 

McDougall, Alexander, 144. 

Megapolensis, Domine, 48. 

Melyn, Cornells, 37, 38. 

Merchants' Exchange, first, 61. 

Merchants, great, of New York, 58, 
238. 

Meriymaking in New York, 119. 

Michaelis, Rev. Jonas, arrives, 18. 

Millborne, Jacob, 84 ; trial of, 95 ; 
death of, 97 ; estate restored, loi. 

Minuit, Peter, first governor of New 
Netherlands, arrives, 14; purchases 
island, 15 ; his powers, 16, and gov- 
ernment, 17; communicates with 
Governor Bradford, 19 ; recalled, 22. 

Minvielle, Gabriel, 113. 

Mohawk and Hudson Railroad, 228. 

Mohawk Indians, declare against 
Leisler, 97. 

Mohawks of New York, 147, 149. 

Monckton, Robert, 76. 

Montague's Tavern, 146. 

Montgomery, Lord John, 76. 

Moore, Sir Henry, 76, 144; orders 
soldiers to keep the peace, 146 ; 
mentioned, 147. 



298 



Morningside Park, 271. 
Murray's Wharf, 150. 

Nancy, first tea ship, 147, 148, 

Navy Yard, 153. 

Negro plot, 116. 

New Amsterdam, settled, 14; captured 
by the English, 43; manners and 
customs in, 52 ; population of, in 
1664, 74. 

New Orange, 78. 

Newspaper extracts, 116. 

New Utrecht, 112, 156, 

New Year's observances, no. 

New York, taken by the English and 
named, 43-49; attacked by Dutch, 
77 ; bounds of, 79 ; joined to New 
England, 81 ; under British rule, 
109; attacked by British, 179; re- 
treat from, 181 ; captured by British, 
179, 181; in 1776, 176; in captivity, 
i86 ; great fire in, i86 ; evacuated by 
British, 192; first capital, 195; ofii- 
cial life in, 1789-1790, 200 ; no longer 
the capital, 202 ^-commercial growth, 
214 ; in Civil War, 254 ; in 1783, 272 ; 
in 1830, 272; in 1850, 273; in 1865, 
274; in 1870, 276; part of West- 
chester County annexed, 277; con- 
solidation of, 279 ; charter of, 280 ; 
compared with London, Paris, and 
Berlin, 286. 

New York Central and Hudson River 
Railroad, 229. 

New York Historical Society, sketch 
of, 212. 

Nicholson, Lieutenant Governor, 83; 
sails for England, 86; appointed 
lieutenant governor of Virginia, 89. 

Nicolls, Colonel Richard, captures 
Manhattan, 43-49 ; mentioned, 75. 

Nicolls, William, 90 ; released, 94. 

Noell, Thomas, assumes mayoralty, 
122. 

Northwest Fur Company, 231. 

Ocean Parkway, 153. 
Orange, P'ort, 26. 
Ordinances, Dutch, 64. 
Osborne, Sir Danvers, 76. 
Osgood mansion, 202, 

Packet ships, 240. 

Park Theater, 263. 

Parties in New York, 143 ; after the 

Revolution, 203 
Patroons, established, 20. 
Pauw, Michael dc, 22 ; purchases 

Staten Island, 22. 
Pear tree, Stuy vesant's, 50. 
Pearl Street, 52. 



Pelham Bay Park, 290. 

Pennsylvania Railroad, 229. 

Phillipse, Adolph, 128. 

Phillipse, Frederick, 83; justice, 105. 

Phillipse manor house, 83. 

Pinhorn, recorder, 95. 

Pirates and privateersmen, 100, loi, 

124 ; names of their vessels, 125. 
Plays in New York, 134. 
Ploughman, collector, 85. 
Prison ships, 188. 

Prisons, military, in New York, 188. 
Prospect Park, 153, 156. 
Public parks, 270, 290. 
Putnam, Fort, 156. 
Putnam, Israel, in New York, 152, 

158; succeeds Sullivan, 163. 

Quackenbos, Walter, 146. 
Quakers, the, 42, 

Rapalje, Sarah, 19. 
Rasieres, Isaac de, 20. 
Red Lion Tavern, 157, 164. 
Rensselaerwyck, founded, 21. 
Revolution, first blood of, spilled in 

New York, 147. 
Riot, Draft, in New York, 256-258. 
Riverside Park, 271. 
Robinson, John, no. 
Robinson, Sir Robert, 95. 
Rogers, Captain Moses, 246. 

Saint Mark's Church, founded, 51. 

Scott, John Morin, 144. 

Sea Mew, the, 14. 

Seal of New Amsterdam, 40. 

Sears, Isaac, 144, 146, 151. 

Servants, 116. 

Shoemakers Creek, 165. 

Slaves, negro, 116. 

Sloughter, Henry, 75 ; appointed 

governor, 89 ; arrives in New York, 

93; death, 99. 
Smit, Claes, 31. 
Smith, Colonel William, 95 ; defends 

Zenger, 105. 
Smith, William, historian, quoted, 109. 
Sons of Liberty, 144, 146, 147; in 

control of New York, 152. 
Spencer, General, 158. 
Staats, Dr. Samuel, 113. 
Stadt Huys, built by Kieft, 34, 55. 
Stages, Broadway, 259. 
Stamp Act, 136. 
Stamp Act riot, the, 140. 
Steamboats, 215 ; invented, 217. 
Steamers, the first, 246. 
Steenwyck, Cornells, 46, 58. 
Stirling, Fort. 155. ^ 

Street car lines, 268. •( 



299 



Street venders, 1830, 265. 

StoU, Sergeant, 86. 

Stores and merchants of New York, 
1705, 128. 

Stuyvesant, Petrus, chosen director, 
34; character, 35; arrival. 35, 36; 
gives charter, 38, and seal, 40 ; at- 
tacks the Swedes, 41 ; placates the 
Indians, 42 ; yields to the English, 
49 ; death, 49 ; mentioned, 70. 

Sugarhouse, 188. 

SuUivan, General, 158 ; his troops en- 
gaged, 167. 

*' Sun," founded, 264. 

" Swamp," the, 118. 

Tammany Hall, 264. 

Tammany Society, sketch of, 212. 

Tea ships, the, 138. 

Tea Party, Boston's, 147. 

Tea Party, New York's, 147. 

Theaters, 134. 

" Times," founded, 264. 

" Tribune," founded, 264. 

Trinity Church, endowed, 74 ; opened, 
112 ; account of, 123. 

Tryon, Sir William, 76 ; character of, 
147 ; in England, 151 ; returns to 
New York, 152. 

Tupper, Benjamin, commands whale- 
boat fleet, 159, 160. 

Tweed Ring, 276. 

Union Defense Committee, organized, 
254- 

Van Cortlandt, Stephanas, mayor, 83, 
87, 88. 

Van Cortlandt Park, 290. 

Van Cortlandt manor house, 291. 

Vanderbilt, Cornelius, 217, 218. 

Van der Grist, schepen, wounded by 
Indians, 41. 

Vanderveer, Pieter Cornelissen, 58. 

Van Dinclage, 36, 37. 

Van Dyck, Hendrik, 32. 

Van Dyck, ex-sheriff, killed by Indi- 
ans, 41. 

Van Rensselaer, Kiliaen, 21. 



Van Twiller, Wouter, chosen direct- 
or, 23 ; described, 23 ; his arrival, 24 ; 
attacks the English, 27, 28 ; removed, 
28. 

Van Wagener, 165. 

Vauxhall Gardens, 262. 

Verrazano, Jean, discovers Bay of 
New York, 7. 

Vlie boats, 63. 

Vries, De, patroon, 24 ; purchases 
Staten Island, 28 ; his plantation 
ravaged by Indians, 30, 42. 

Walk down Broadway, 259. 

Wall, city, 53. 

Wall Street, 53. 

Wallabout Bay, 155. 

Walloon yeomen, 71. 

Walloons, settle New Netherlands, 13. 

Washington, passes through New 
York, 152 ; takes command on Long 
Island, 169 ; retreats from Long 
Island, 172 ; takes leave of his offi- 
cers, 193 ; inaugurated, 196 ; his 
levees, 202. 

Washington, Fort, 184. 

Washington Park, 153. 

West India Company, described, 12. 

West Shore Railroad, 229. 

Whaleboat fleet, 159. 

Whitehall Street, 61. 

Whitehall mansion, 61. 

Willett, Marinus, 144. 

William of Orange, king, 81 ; ap- 
proves Leisler's sentence, 98 ; death 
of, 103. 

WiUiam Henry, Fort, 122. 

Williamsburgh, 289. 

Winthrop, Governor, 46, 77. 

Wolves, bounty on, 64. 

Woman's Central Relief Association, 

255- 
Wooley, Rev. James, quoted, no. 

" World," founded 264. 

Young, John, 95. 

Zenger, John Peter, founds "Weekly 
Journal," 104; trial of, for libel, 
105 ; acquitted, 107. 



A School History 

of the United States 

By John Bach McMaster 

Professor of American History in the University of 

Pennsylvania. 

Linen, i2mo, 507 pages. With maps and illustrations . . ^i.oo 

Tiiis new history of our country is marked by many 
original and superior features which will commend it alike 
to teachers, students, and general readers. The narra- 
tive is a word-picture of the great events and scenes of 
American history,- told in such a way as to awaken enthu- 
siasm in the study and make an indelible impression on 
the mind. From the beginning the attention of the 
student is directed to causes and results, and he is thus 
encouraged to follow the best methods of studying history 
•as a connected growth of ideas and institutions, and not a 
bare compendium of facts and dates. Special prominence 
is given to the social, industrial, and economic develop- 
ment of the country, to the domestic life and institutions 
of the people, and to such topics as the growth of inven- 
tions, the highways of travel and commerce, and the pro- 
gress of the people in art, science, and literature. The 
numerous maps give vivid impressions of the early 
voyages, explorations, and settlements, of the chief mili- 
tary campaigns, of the territorial growth of the country, 
and of its population at different periods, while the 
pictures on almost every page illustrate different phases in 
the civil and domestic life of the people. 



Copies of McMaster s School History of the United States will 

be sent, prepaid, to any address on receipt of 

the price by the Publishers: 

American Book Company 

NEW YORK ♦ CINCINNATI . CHICAGO 

(32) 



Fisher's Brief History of the Nations 

AND OF THEIR PROGRESS IN CIVILIZATION 
By GEORGE PARK FISHER, LL.D. 

Professor in Yale University 

Cloth, 12mo, 613 pages, with numerous Illustrations, Maps, Tables, and 
Reproductions of Bas-reliefs, Portraits, and Paintings. Price, $1 .50 



This is an entirely new work written expressly to meet 
the demand for a compact and acceptable text-book on 
General History for high schools, academies, and private 
schools. Some of the distinctive qualities which will com- 
mend this book to teachers and students are as follows: 

It narrates in fresh, vigorous, and attractive style the 
most important facts of history in their due order and 
connection. 

It explains the nature of historical evidence, and records 
only well established judgments respecting persons and 
events. 

It delineates the progress of peoples and nations in 
civilization as well as the rise and succession of dynasties. 

It connects, in a single chain of narration, events related 
to each other in the contemporary history of different 
nations and countries. 

It gives special prominence to the history of the 
Mediaeval and Modern Periods, — the eras of greatest 
import to modern students. 

It is written from the standpoint of the present, and 
incorporates the latest discoveries of historical explorers 
and writers. 

It is illustrated by numerous colored maps, genealog- 
ical tables, and artistic reproductions of architecture, 
sculpture, painting, and portraits of celebrated men, 
representing every period of the world's history. 



Copies of Fisher's Brief History of the Nations will be sent prepaid to 
any address, on receipt of the price y by the Publishers : 

American Book Company 

New York ♦ Cincinnati ♦ Chicago 

(43) 



Carpenter's Geographical Readers 

By Frank G. Carpenter 

North America. Cloth, i2mo, 352 pages . . 60 cents 

Asia. Cloth, i2mo, 304 pages . . . .60 cents 

This series of Geographical Readers is intended to 
describe the several continents, — their countries and 
peoples, from the standpoint of travel and personal 
observation. 

They are not mere compilations from other books, or 
stories of imaginary travels, but are based on actual travel 
and personal observation. The author, who is an experi- 
enced traveler and writer, has given interesting and viva- 
cious descriptions of his recent extended journeys through 
each of the countries described, together with graphic 
pictures of their native peoples, just as they are found 
to-day in their homes and at their work. This has been 
done in such simple language and charming manner as to 
make each chapter as entertaining as a story. 

The books are well supplied with colored maps and 
illustrations, the latter mostly reproductions from original 
photographs taken by the author on the ground. They 
combine studies in geography with stories of travel and 
observation in a manner at once attractive and instructive. 
Their use in connection with the regular text-books on 
geography and history will impart a fresh and living 
interest to their lessons. 



Copies of Carpenter s Geographical Reader will be sent prepaid to any 
address, on receipt of the price, by the Publishers : 

American Book Company 

New York ♦ Cincir^nati ♦ Chicago 

(47) 



The Natural Geographies 



Natural Elementary Geography 

Linen Binding, Quarto, 144 pages . , , Price, 60 cents 

Natural Advanced Geography 

Linen Binding, Large Quarto, 160 pages . . Price, $1 25' 
By Jacques W. Redway, F.R.G.S., and Russell Kinman, Author 
of the Eclectic Physical Geography. 

The publication of The Natural Geographies marks a new erai 
in the study and teaching of geography. Some of the distinctive features 
which characterize this new series are : 

1. A Natural Plan of Development, based on physical geography and 

leading in a natural manner to the study of historical, industrial,, 
and commercial geography. 

2. Clear and distinct political maps showing correctly 'the comparative 

size of different countries, and physical maps showing relief by 
contour lines and different colors, as in the best government maps. 

Inductive and comparative treatment of subjects according to the 
most approved pedagogical principles. 

Frequent exercises and reviews leading to the correlation and 
comparison of the parts of the subject already studied. 

Topical outlines for the language work required by the Courses of 
Study of the best schools. 

Supplementary Exercises including laboratory work and references 
for collateral reading. 

Numerous original and appropriate pictures and graphic diagrams 
to illustrate the text. 

8, Clear explanations of each necessary term where it first occurs, and 
omission of formal definitions at the beginning of the book. 

Strict accordance, in method and treatment, with the recommenda- 
tions of the Committee of Fifteen. 



Illustrated Circulars describing the plan and method of 
the Natural Geographies will be sent free to any address on 
application. 

Copies of the Natural Geographies will be se7tt, prepaid, to any 
address on receipt of the price by the Publishers : 

American Book Company 

NEW YORK * CINCINNATI • CHICAGO 

148) 



Pupils' Outline Studies 

IN THE 

HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES 

BY 

FRANCIS H.WHITE, A.M. 
Paper. Square Octavo, 128 pages - - Price. 30 cents 



This is a book of Outline Studies, Maps and Blanks, 
intended for use in connection with the study of United 
States History. It contains an original and systematic 
combination o*f devices consisting of outline maps, graphic 
charts, and blanks for historical tables and summaries, for 
the reproduction of pictures, for biographical sketches, for 
studies in civil government, etc. It also contains valuable 
suggestions to teachers and pupils, and carefully selected 
lists of historical books and authorities for collateral reading 
and reference. 

Its use will encourage the pupil to observe closely, to 
select the leading and salient facts of history, to classify his 
knowledge, to investigate for himself, and to carry his inves- 
tigations up to recognized authorities and even to original 
sources. It also furnishes opportunity and material for the 
best exercises and training in English Composition. 

The book is conveniently arranged for either class or 
individual instruction and may be used in connection with 
any text-book on United States History. 



Copies of White's Pupils' Outline Studies will be sent prepaid to any 
address^ on receipt of the price ^ by the Publishers: 

American Book Company 

New York ♦ Cincinnati ♦ Chicago 

(28) 



